Ethnicity isn’t everything
The email was all in capital letters, maybe for emphasis or maybe just because it was easier to leave the caps lock key on.
“MY HUBBY INSISTED I DO THIS,” she wrote, with some heat, about the DNA test he wanted her to take. “WHY? 1 LINE GOES BACK TO YEAR I. ANOTHER 26 GENERATIONS. 2 MORE TO 1400’S, ANOTHER 1500’S. ACCORDING TO YOU I WILL LEARN NADA, ZIP, ZERO. IF IT SAID 10% WALES, 10% SPANISH THAT WOULD BE HELPFUL. I THINK IT’LL BE MONEY WASTED.”
Oh, dear. Granted The Legal Genealogist definitely isn’t a fan of DNA testing for ethnicity, because of the inability to reliably determine ethnicity below the continental level.1
But if anybody has read anything I’ve written as meaning that testing is a waste of money or that the person tested would learn “NADA, ZIP, ZERO” — well, then, I haven’t done my job right here at all.
First off, even a continental level ethnicity result is educational to begin with. At a minimum, we’re all discovering that we’re a lot more interesting ethnically than we thought. “Researchers have found that a significant percentage of African-Americans, European Americans, and Latinos carry ancestry from outside their self-identified ethnicity. The average African-American genome, for example, is nearly a quarter European, and almost 4% of European Americans carry African ancestry.”2
Citing research by 23andMe, that article in Science went on: “At least 3.5% of European Americans carry African ancestry, though the averages vary significantly by state. In South Carolina and Louisiana, about 12% of European Americans have at least 1% African ancestry. In Louisiana, too, about 8% of European Americans carry at least 1% Native American ancestry.”3
In other words, what we think we know about our ethnicity — and what we actually can find out even at the broadest continental level where the reliability is highest — can be very different.
But ethnicity estimates are hardly the only reason — not even the major reason — to do DNA testing. The two big reasons to do it are: (1) to confirm what we think we know; and (2) to connect with cousins we otherwise wouldn’t know.
Confirming the paper trail research is one excellent reason to test, no matter how good we think our research is. Getting a DNA result that gives us scientific evidence to back up what we think we know about our families, or to test a theory we might have about that brickwall ancestor, is a great thing and by itself worth the price of a DNA test.
But it’s also worth the price of a test to find out maybe we’re not so right in our conclusions. Even those of us who have — or think we have — a line that “GOES BACK TO YEAR I” or “26 GENERATIONS” may find that our paper trail genealogy has run off the rails somewhere along the line. An undocumented adoption of a child, for example. A remarriage where the children of the first marriage took the surname of the second husband.
Some people don’t want to find out that their research is incomplete. They’re afraid of finding out that, maybe, that Mayflower line isn’t their line at all. Or they really don’t descend from a Cherokee princess.
But for every line we may lose through DNA testing, another one — the right one — is gained. Putting us back on track in our research is certainly something we as genealogists need to embrace, not shy away from and certainly not fear.
Moreover, in so many cases, what we’re really discovering is that we have a new biological family line to research in addition to the social family line we’re part of. The family of that second husband stays part of our social family history — stays in our overall family tree — even if we don’t connect biologically. Families have always been built of more than just blood. For that matter, even that family story of the Cherokee can stay a family story (properly footnoted with the DNA results, of course).
And perhaps the greatest reason to test is to connect with cousins we wouldn’t even know were out there otherwise. Few of us grow up knowing our second or third cousins. Yet every one of those people may very well have bits and pieces of our mutual family history that we would love to know about.
That Family Bible with the names and dates and places carefully inscribed on the family history pages.
The location of a fourth great grandparent’s burial.
That photograph of the second or third great grandparents.
A photograph of our own parents or grandparents as children sent off decades ago to an aunt or uncle.
I don’t know about you, but every one of those is something I would love to add to my own knowledge about my family.
If taking a DNA test is the price of admission to the great lottery of cousin-finding that might lead to even one of them… well… all I can say is, at less than $100 for the most expensive autosomal test out there, it’s a small price to pay, and hardly a waste of money.
So yes, my friend, you may have researched back to year 1. But DNA may still tell you something you don’t already know, or just confirm for you that you’re right. Either way, it’s worth it.
Come on into the DNA testing pool.
The water’s fine.
SOURCES
- See e.g. Judy G. Russell, “The percentages, revisited,” The Legal Genealogist, posted 1 May 2016 (https://www.legalgenealogist.com/blog : accessed 24 Feb 2018). ↩
- Lizzie Wade, “Genetic study reveals surprising ancestry of many Americans,” Science, posted 14 Dec 2014 (http://www.sciencemag.org/ : accessed 24 Feb 2018). ↩
- Ibid. ↩
Confirming research has been everything for me. Very little paper exists for the 18th/19th c. frontier lines I struggle with. DNA has confirmed two lines and given me focus on two others. The lack of DNA matches to people I expect to find has forced me to reexamine theories. It’s a gold mine of information.
Genealogy finds our past, DNA finds our present.
So true. We thought we knew our family lines pretty well, only to discover that gr-grandma Sarah in 1862, while her husband was in the Civil War, had another man as father of her only child. I just hope that father was someone she cared about–in that time and in our area, it could have been something much worse, but we’ll never know. When I told my cousins, one said “from now on, I think I’m going to take genealogy as suggestions, rather than fact” and of course I think it’s estimated perhaps 10 percent don’t have the biological relationship that’s marked on the family tree. I always prefer the truth so I’m glad I did the testing and was able to get about 19 other family members to do it with me, it’s been interesting and fun these past few years.
I am learning DNA testing can provide more mystery than solutions. DNA and Paper trails that match do not always confirm a correct paper trail. I have a DNA match with a matching paper trail showing a common ancestor 8 generations back on my father’s side. The same DNA match showed up in my mother’s profile with a different possible matching surname. At 8 generations I am not guaranteed a DNA match so I am now trying to trace my mother’s side DNA match and wondering if the father’s side paper trail is correct. Both paper trails on my father’s side stayed in England until recently while my mother’s side was an early New England Immigrant. The DNA match has no shared matches. More questions than answers.
So well said, Judy! I am always telling people that atDNA testing especially is all about (1) finding cousins and (2) confirming research/documentation. My Mom and I confirmed what she had always heard as a child…that she had Jewish great-great-grandparents. She was thrilled! Now to figure out where the ones who stayed in Bohemia and Vienna went…
There is a long tradition of cousins marrying, in the olde days, it’s not surprising that you found common ancestors on both sides of the family tree.
DNA testing confirmed my paper trail on both paternal and maternal lines,both going back to early New England. Plus the maternal Y DNA links to a mulatto ancestor in early 1700’s Connecticut!
Thanks Judy,
My understanding is that there are few if any other types of source material that can provide the same level of certainty for a biological claim. When paired with a well researched paper trail, a genealogist or family historian can go from being just “pretty sure” to being relatively “certain”. That increase in reliability makes all the difference.
Like many others, I have been able to use DNA results to back up my normal research and in several cases where I had brick walls (where no physical documentation appears to exist) I have been able to verify my distant cousin’s line and then use inference, logical deduction and the process of elimination to verify my line to a near certain degree. Without those DNA results, it is likely I never would have been able complete those connections. I have documented this process in several proof arguments on my blog.
I would also like to note for your readers who may be unaware, there are no recognized, i.e., documented, ancestries that go back much further than about 400 A.D., the earliest being some Irish lines. The Gen-Medieval-L mailing list is a great source of information for all such inquiries.
So far, DNA testing has reunited us with three 2d cousins we’d lost track of as the older generation of 1st cousins who had been keeping each other up to date on all the family news gradually died off. Each of the 2d cousins has their own unique memories and knowledge to share about our grandparents and great grandparents and it all fits together with ours like the pieces of a giant jigsaw puzzle. It didn’t add any new ancestors to the family tree. What it did was help us get to know them better as real live people with human faces and unique personalities of their own, instead of names and dates on a family tree. For me, that is the whole point of doing genealogy in the first place.
Judy,
All so fascinating! I had a conversation this morning with a young Haitian woman born in the US who’s considering Ancestry DNA. She says her family doesn’t “look Haitian,” because they have a Chinese grandfather. Chinese workers came to Haiti to build railroads, and intermarried with “locals” who were originally mostly from Senegal. She and her cousins would like to confirm/disconfirm all this. I encouraged her, as long as she takes it with a grain of salt. Three different continents are involved, so the ethnicity results should show something.
My mother’s family is, by paper trail, completely Norwegian. One of her sisters married into a family that’s, again by paper trail, completely Dutch. One of my cousins called me a couple of months ago, all excited because his brother had gotten back his Ancestry results, and they were “weird,” in terms of ethnicity. More than half Norwegian, about a third Dutch, and a sizable chunk Iberian. That’s all in the same continent, to start with. But after we talked a while about the history of those places, we realized that the Vikings settled all over Western Europe, bringing their genes with them. And for at least 100 to 200 years, the Netherlands were ruled by the Spaniards. So the ethnic results made a little more sense. And they didn’t contradict the paper trails we’ve worked so hard to compile.
Thanks for your work,
Doris
I believe DNA testing is great to determine ethnicity, to learn that we have a small percentage of this ethnic group or even a large percentage of a previously unsuspected ethnic group. However, while I feel DNA testing can be useful in confirming an existing paper trail, I think it is quite useless to establish a paper trail considering all the various adoptions, sailors on leave, wars, overly friendly neighbors and all around hanky-panky that has gone on for centuries even back to caveman days – note the European genome with a few percent Neanderthal. How disappointing it would be to think you have your ancestry back to the 1400’s only to learn your ggrandfather is the product of his mother and her neighbor.
I’d rather think of it as exciting that I’d now have a new line from that “new” 2nd great grandfather to research. I’d still have the social family history of the father who raised the great grandfather, and now I’d have a new line too.
Have tested with Ancestry, Family Tree, and 23 & Me. All basically show the same results but each pool has new cousins for me to connect with. And, Family Tree has Haplogroup studies going on for some. I learned a lot with a new analysis of my Haplogroup W5. Talk about a paper trail.
Hello Sue,
My husband has also Haplogroup W5. I’ve not found too much, I’ve read that it’s a super rare hg. I would greatly appreciate it if we could be in touch and compare the information that we found! Could you send me an e-mail? deenapolka@gmail.com
My father’s initial test results at FTDNA were approximately 48% British / 47% Scandinavian. We have no known Scandinavian ancestors, & I scored mostly British & 0% Scandinavian. Yet, I could run a Gedmatch admixture calculator and we both scored the same top population at similar Fst. Then on an upgrade, my father’s Scandinavian completely disappeared, leaving him mostly British plus new E. Europe. My British dropped considerably, and I picked up more West Europe. Sorry, but I’ve taken several commercial DNA tests and can run more Gedmatch calculators, matching Scottish here, England there, German there … no ethnic consistency. Further, the inter-continental trace admixture is inconsistent, even after allowing for threshold variances. Hence, I do not believe that biogeographical genetic tests are ready for prime time.
The ethnicity part of the tests may leave quite a bit to be desired — but the cousin matching is truly unparalleled. That is the part of DNA testing that’s really really worth it.
I totally agree. The value of making connections with DNA cousins and sharing information far outweigh the ethnicity estimates at the present time.
I totally agree that DNA testing is worth it for the cousins.
But many people are enticed to test on the basis of ethnicity alone. For those who have already traced back to Europe on all lines, it is easy to see that the errors often outweigh the value.
Testers also don;t help themselves when they obsess about tiny amounts.
There are other glaring errors as well.
Some labs still score Cornish as if they have some Iberian – maybe from the ancient beaker people or thereabouts, but people think they have to go looking for some Spanish input in the last few hundred years.
I don’t have any Scandinavian input since the Norman invasion. One lab fixed this. Another still shows 18% Scandinavian. Yeah, Rollo was my ancestor, but that was a while ago and not 18% worth.
Most people I know, feel that ethnicity is currently over promised in advertising and under delivered. The tragedy is that some of them have not enjoyed the ethnicity experience and are now loudly bad-mouthing DNA testing as a whole.
Had to feel sorry for one lady, though, who complained that her ethnicity estimated came back showing 20% Sub-Saharan Africa, and so did her son’s. So they both tested with a different company and got the same result — 20% Sub-Saharan Africa for both. She insisted she had documentation to prove they were both 100% “white” (that’s the word she used) so all four tests absolutely had to be wrong. She could not bring herself to even consider the possibility that someone, somewhere in her family tree might have succeeded in crossing the color line without leaving a trace in the documents.
I think what we are seeing is that most people are expecting their ethnicity estimates to align with their genealogy research, however, those provided by DNA testing companies are looking at a different dataset entirely. All hope is not lost: http://gigatrees.appspot.com/blog/estimating-ethnicities.html