African Roots Podcast Episode #284 September 12, 2014

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Welcome back to the African Roots Podcast! You can reach me at AfricanRootsPodcast@gmail.com.

Story Corps Booth

This message is for friends in St. Louis: StoryCorps, the ongoing national oral history program has arrived in St. Louis and the mobile booth will be there for the next 30 days or so. They are conducting oral history interviews and I know that they are hoping to have a good number of African Americans involved in the project. As of today they still have a some openings on their schedule. (About 8 open slots are still available right now!) Get your own story told and have it a part of the Library of Congress and the Smithsonian’s permanent collections! But if you don’t get on the immediate schedule they expect to have additional openings over the month, as many times people have changes in their schedules. so there is also a waiting list. Get on that list if you can! They have a few slots open for today, so please tell your story! The mobile booth is located at the Missouri History MuseumIf you listen to the local NPR station you will have possibly heard about the project. I just spoke with one of the organizers. Here is more information! Act quickly as the slots are filling fast!

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A Georgia Genealogy Society Webinar

I am getting ready for a webinar next week on the 17th of September with the Georgia Genealogy Society. My focus is using databases and search engines to find African American families. I shall focus on how to use the large databases such as the subscription and free sites, and also how to use the African American-specific sites. And included will be some suggestions on how to use search engines to find unique African American data.

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Upcoming Events September & October

In the Greater Baltimore Washington area on September 20th there will be a special presentation on African American Newspapers by Tim Pinnick.

Other Fall Genealogy Events:

AAHGS National Conference

Chicago African American Genealogical & Historical Society Annual Conference

Indiana African American Genealogy Group will host Melvin Collier as a speaker also.

As I look toward 2015 things are unfolding. The 2015 Federation of Genealogical Societies will hold their annual conference in Salt Lake City in February of 2015. At the same time Roots Tech will be unfolding at the same place at the same time –the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City, Utah! I will be attending both conferences, and will be speaking at Roots Tech.

Another event that I might consider attending just to learn, will be the annual institute hosted by the Council for the Advancement of Forensic Genealogy that will take place in Texas in March 2015. Note that there are actually two institutes that will unfold during the same week, one for beginners and one for more advanced forensic researchers. Forensic genealogy and DNA are the two areas that I think are the new frontier for genealogical research.

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Are you researching the era of slavery? If you are, and if you have been involved in any degree of work pertaining to that era, you might find that last night’s episode of Bernice Bennett’s show will inspire you. Her guest was Konnetta Alexander of Tennessee, who has immersed herself totally in the process of studying the lives of enslaved people, and telling their stories. Some of us remember her presentation at the AAHGS conference of enslaved Matilda telling her story of her life. Her work extends so much more beyond that as well.

Konnetta Alexander

 She spoke about the resources beyond finding the names of enslaved in wills, but she pointed out additional resources that exist for people to document this period in history. This was a very inspiring interview. As you know Bernice Bennett’s show, Research at the National Archives & Beyond, airs every Thursday evening at 9pm on Blog Talk Radio.

I strongly suggest listening to this episode, because the dialogue suggested the many possibilities that exist for researchers to take their work in new directions. I also found that the inspiration that emanated from that interview to extend to the greater community. There is possibility for us to consider developing a new curriculum. So many of us are out there with a number of our own initiatives and there are “specialists” in African American genealogy from various places. This is good thing, but there is no standard curriculum. We have a foundation that has already been laid by those who have dared to go in that direction, but perhaps there is a larger need for a standard curriculum to be created, an African American Genealogy Methods Primer is perhaps needed, and I would urge any and all who could undertake such a project to direct such a collaboration, to do so. The time has come.

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Call for Presentations

Opportunities for those wishing to present at the Southern California Genealogy Jamboree are at hand. The deadline is October 1st, so if you are considering speaking there next year,

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Well thank you so much for tuning in for this week’s podcast! I appreciate your time, and I love hearing from all of you, thank you. Have a great week ahead, and remember to keep researching, keep documenting and keep sharing what you find!

 

 

Posted by Angela Y. Walton-Raji

Author, lecturer and researcher. Author, "Black Indian Genealogy Research, An Expanded Edition". Editor, Voices of Indian Territory. Member AAHGS -Afro-American Historical & Genealogical Society. PAAC-Preservation of African American Cemeteries. Founding Member of AfriGeneas. Faculty member for Samford IGHR, MAAGI-Midwest African American Genealogy Institute.

1 thought on “African Roots Podcast Episode #284 September 12, 2014

  1. Thanks Angela for the heads up about Story Corps, sharing with my St. Louis Family and Friends and area pages.

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