The Genealogical Sublime
Since the early 2000s, genealogy has become a lucrative business, an accelerating online industry, a massive data mining project, and fodder for reality television. But the fact remains that our contemporary fascination with family history cannot be understood independently of the powerful technological tools that aid and abet in the search for traces of blood, belonging, and difference.

In The Genealogical Sublime, Julia Creet traces the histories of the largest, longest-running, most lucrative, and most rapidly growing genealogical databases to delineate a broader history of the industry. As each unique case study reveals, new database and DNA technologies enable an obsessive completeness-the desire to gather all of the world's genealogical records in the interests of life beyond death. Archival research and firsthand interviews with Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints officials, key industry players (including Ancestry.com founders and Family Search executives), and professional and amateur family historians round out this timely and essential study.
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The Genealogical Sublime
Since the early 2000s, genealogy has become a lucrative business, an accelerating online industry, a massive data mining project, and fodder for reality television. But the fact remains that our contemporary fascination with family history cannot be understood independently of the powerful technological tools that aid and abet in the search for traces of blood, belonging, and difference.

In The Genealogical Sublime, Julia Creet traces the histories of the largest, longest-running, most lucrative, and most rapidly growing genealogical databases to delineate a broader history of the industry. As each unique case study reveals, new database and DNA technologies enable an obsessive completeness-the desire to gather all of the world's genealogical records in the interests of life beyond death. Archival research and firsthand interviews with Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints officials, key industry players (including Ancestry.com founders and Family Search executives), and professional and amateur family historians round out this timely and essential study.
24.95 In Stock
The Genealogical Sublime

The Genealogical Sublime

by Julia Creet
The Genealogical Sublime

The Genealogical Sublime

by Julia Creet

Paperback(First Edition)

$24.95 
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Overview

Since the early 2000s, genealogy has become a lucrative business, an accelerating online industry, a massive data mining project, and fodder for reality television. But the fact remains that our contemporary fascination with family history cannot be understood independently of the powerful technological tools that aid and abet in the search for traces of blood, belonging, and difference.

In The Genealogical Sublime, Julia Creet traces the histories of the largest, longest-running, most lucrative, and most rapidly growing genealogical databases to delineate a broader history of the industry. As each unique case study reveals, new database and DNA technologies enable an obsessive completeness-the desire to gather all of the world's genealogical records in the interests of life beyond death. Archival research and firsthand interviews with Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints officials, key industry players (including Ancestry.com founders and Family Search executives), and professional and amateur family historians round out this timely and essential study.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781625344809
Publisher: University of Massachusetts Press
Publication date: 01/17/2020
Series: Public History in Historical Perspective
Edition description: First Edition
Pages: 176
Product dimensions: 5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.70(d)
Age Range: 18 Years

About the Author

JULIA CREET is professor of English at York University and director and producer of the 2016 documentary film, Data Mining the Deceased: Ancestry and the Business of Family.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments vii

Introduction 1

Chapter 1 Confucius 26

The Oldest Genealogy in the World

Chapter 2 The Mormons 38

Doctrine and Data

Chapter 3 Ancestry.Inc 71

Chapter 4 Iceland 95

End Games

Chapter 5 Genetic Genealogy 119

The Double Helix of Inheritance

Chapter 6 The New Native 144

Sublime Percentages of Self and Belonging

Chapter 7 The Genealogical Sublime 161

We Are All Related

Notes 171

Index 199

What People are Saying About This

Jerome de Groot

An engaging overview of the growth and resourcing of family history in North America.

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