“Turning Points” For Aging Genealogists: Claiming Identities And Histories In Time

Karla B. Hackstaff

doi:10.18778/1733-8077.5.1.07

Authors

Karla B. Hackstaff Northern Arizona University, USA

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/1733-8077.5.1.07

Keywords:

Genealogy, Family history, Identity, Turning point, Aging, Generation, Race, Class, Gender, Baby boomers

Abstract

Based on qualitative in-depth interviews, I examine the use of genealogy with regard to the current historical moment for identities rooted in kin, race, class, gender, nation—and age. Drawing on the concept of “turning points” coined by Anselm Strauss, I explore moments that motivate the doing of family genealogy. First, I suggest that Strauss’s turning points may occur simultaneously and converge like vectors across time. Second, I argue that late middle-age lends itself to “identity extensions”, which I define as a reevaluation of self that acknowledges one or more of the following: the significance of extended kin to one’s identity; reverence for ancestors; a social responsibility to the future. Finally, I analyze how the current era informs a particular generation’s genealogical endeavors. I conceive of U.S. baby boomers’ genealogical projects as an expression of longing for connections in family lives and for a place in social history across the generations.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Author Biography

Karla B. Hackstaff, Northern Arizona University, USA

Karla B. Hackstaff (Ph.D.) is an Associate Professor of sociology at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Arizona, USA. Her research and teaching are in the areas of family relations, race-gender-class, social psychology, and qualitative methods. She is author of the book Marriage in a Culture of Divorce (Temple, 1999), continues research on family history, and is currently working on the meanings of age, illness, and injury in family relations.

References

Altheide, David and John M. Johnson (1994) “Criteria for Assessing Interpretive Validity in Qualitative Research”. Pp. 283-312 in Collecting and Interpreting Qualitative Materials. Edited by N. Denzin and Y. S. Lincoln. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Google Scholar

Auslander, Mark (2001) “The Myth of Kitty: Paradoxes of Blood, Law and Slavery in a Georgia Community”. Atlanta, Georgia: Working Paper No. 1, The Emory Center for Myth and Ritual in American Life.
Google Scholar

Auslander, Mark (2002) “‘Something We Need to Get Back To’: Mythologies of Origin and Rituals of Solidarity in African American Working Families”. Atlanta, Georgia: Working Paper No. 6, The Emory Center for Myth and Ritual in American Life.
Google Scholar

Azoulay, Katya Gibel (1997) Black, Jewish and Interracial: It’s Not the Color of Your Skin, but the Race of Your Kin, and Other Myths of Identity. Durham, NC: Duke.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv11hppbz

Bouquet, Mary (2000) “Figures of Relations: Reconnecting Kinship Studies and Museum Collections.” Pp. 167-190 in Cultures of Relatedness: New Approaches to the Study of Kinship. Edited by J. Carsten. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Google Scholar

Carsten, Janet, editor (2000) Cultures of Relatedness: New Approaches to the Study of Kinship. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Google Scholar

Charmaz, Kathy (2005) “Grounded Theory in the 21st Century: Applications for Social Justice Studies.” Pp. 507-535 in The Sage Handbook of Qualitative Research 3rd ed., edited by N. Denzin and Y. Lincoln. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Google Scholar

Coontz, Stephanie (1992) The Way We Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap. New York: Basic Books.
Google Scholar

DaCosta, Kimberly M. (2000) Remaking the Color Line: Social Bases and Implications of the Multicultural Movement. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation. Sociology Department, University of California, Berkeley.
Google Scholar

Delaney, Carol (2001) “Cutting the Ties That Bind: The Sacrifice of Abraham and Patriarchal Kinship.” Pp. 445-462 in Relative Values: Reconfiguring Kinship Studies, edited by S. Franklin and S. McKinnon. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822383222-017

Denzin, Norman (1989) Interpretive Interactionism. Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.4135/9781412984584

Edwards, Jeanette and Marilyn Strathern (1990) “Including Our Own.” Pp. 149-66 in Cultures of Relatedness, edited by J. Carsten. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Google Scholar

Erikson, Erik H. (1950/1963) Childhood and Society. 2nd edition. New York: W.W. Norton and Company.
Google Scholar

Erikson, Erik H. (1984) “Reflections on the Last Stage—And the First.” Psychoanalytic Study of the Child 39: 155-165.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00797308.1984.11823424

Fausto-Sterling, Anne (2000) Sexing the Body. New York: Basic Books.
Google Scholar

Gates, Henry L. (2006) African American Lives. Kunhardt Productions, Inc. Educational Broadcasting Corporation and Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
Google Scholar

Glaser, Barney and Anselm Strauss (1967) The Discovery of Grounded Theory. Chicago, IL: Aldine Publishing Company.
Google Scholar

Hackstaff, Karla (forthcoming June 2009) “Who are We? Genealogists Negotiating Ethno-Racial Identities.” Qualitative Sociology 32(2).
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11133-009-9126-4

Hackstaff, Karla (1999) Marriage in a Culture of Divorce. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
Google Scholar

Haley, Alex (1976) Roots: The Saga of an American Family. NY: Doubleday.
Google Scholar

Harvey, David (1989) The Condition of Postmodernity. Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell.
Google Scholar

Hochschild, Arlie Russell (1983) The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Google Scholar

Holstein, James. A. and Jaber F. Gubrium (2007) “Constructionist Perspectives on the Life Course.” Sociology Compass 1(1): 335-352. Retrieved April 28, 2008 http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1751-9020.2007.00004.x
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1751-9020.2007.00004.x

Ifekwunigwe, Jayne O., editor (2004) “Introduction: Rethinking ‘Mixed Race’ Studies.” Pp. 1-29 in ‘Mixed Race’ Studies. New York: Routledge.
Google Scholar

Jacobson, Matthew Frye (2006) Roots Too: White Ethnic Revival in Post-Civil Rights America. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.4159/9780674039063

Karp, David (1988) “A Decade of Reminders: Changing Age Consciousness between Fifty and Sixty Years Old.” The Gerontologist 6: 727-38.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/geront/28.6.727

Kotarba Joseph A. and John M. Johnson, editors (2002) Postmodern Existential Sociology. 3rd Ed. Walnut Creek, CA: Rowman Altamira Press.
Google Scholar

Kroger, Jane and Vivienne Adair (2008) “Symbolic Meanings of Valued Personal Objects in Identity Transitions of Late Adulthood.” Identity: An International Journal of Theory and Research 8: 5-24.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/15283480701787251

Kung, Hsiang-Ching, Donna L. Hoyert, Jiaquang Xu, and Sherry L. Murphy (2008) “Deaths: Final Data for 2005.” National Vital Statistics Reports 56 (10). Retrieved August 24, 2008 http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/lifexpec.htm
Google Scholar

Lambert, James D. and Gordon Thomasson (1997) “Mormon American Families.” Pp. 85-108 in Families in Cultural Context: Strengths and Challenges in Diversity, edited by M. K. DeGenova. Mountain View, CA: Mayfield Publishing Company.
Google Scholar

Mills, C. Wright (1940) “Situated Actions and Vocabularies of Motive.” American Sociological Review 5: 904-913.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/2084524

Mills, C. Wright (1959) The Sociological Imagination. New York: Oxford.
Google Scholar

Nash, Catherine (2002) “Genealogical Identities.” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 20: 27-52.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1068/d314

National Center for Health Statistics (2007) Trends in the Health of Americans. Hyattsville, MD. United States. Retrieved August 24, 2008 http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/hus07.pdf#027
Google Scholar

Obama, Barak (1995) Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance. New York: Three Rivers Press.
Google Scholar

Parham, Angela A. (2008) “Race, Memory and Family History” in Social Identities 14(1):13-32.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/13504630701848465

Riessman, Catherine Kohler (2008) Narrative Methods for the Human Sciences. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Google Scholar

Schneider, David (1967/1980) American Kinship: A Cultural Account. 2nd edition. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.7208/chicago/9780226227092.001.0001

Shore, Brad (2002) “Salem Camp Meeting: A Theater of Family Memory.” The Emory Center for Myth and Ritual in American Life. Atlanta, Georgia: Working Paper #11.
Google Scholar

Skolnick, Arlene (1991) Embattled Paradise: The American Family in an Age of Uncertainty. New York: Basic Books.
Google Scholar

Smolenyak, Megan (2000) In Search of Our Ancestors. Holbrook, Massachusetts: Adams Media Corporation.
Google Scholar

Sorell, Gwendolyn and Marilyn Montgomery (2001) “Feminist perspectives on the relevance of Erikson’s theory for contemporary identity development research.” Identity: An International Journal of Theory and Research 2: 97-128.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1207/S1532706XID0102_01

Strauss, Anselm L. (1959/2007) Mirrors and Masks: The Search for Identity. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers.
Google Scholar

Taylor, Stephanie and Karen Littleton (2006) “Biographies in Talk: A Narrative-Discursive Research Approach.” Qualitative Sociology Review 2(1): 22-38.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.18778/1733-8077.2.1.03

The New York Times. Barack Obama’s Speech on Race. March 18, 2008. Retrieved March 22, 2008 http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/18/us/politics/18textobama.html
Google Scholar

Toepke, Alvaro and Angel Serrano (1999) The Language You Cry In: The Story of a Mende Song. San Francisco, CA: California Newsreel. (Video recording).
Google Scholar

Tyler, Katharine (2005) “The Genealogical Imagination: The Inheritance of Interracial Identities.” The Sociological Review 53(3): 475-494.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-954X.2005.00562.x

Wade, Peter (2002) Race, Nature and Culture: An Anthropological Perspective. Sterling, Virginia: Pluto Press.
Google Scholar

Waters, Mary (1990) Ethnic Options: Choosing Identities in America. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Google Scholar

Worchel, Stephen (1999) Written in Blood: Ethnic Identity and the Struggle for Human Harmony. New York: Worth Publishers.
Google Scholar

Yuval-Davis, Nira (2006) “Belonging and the Politics of Belonging.” Patterns of Prejudice 40(3): 197-214.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00313220600769331

Zerubavel, Eviatar (2003) Time Maps: Collective Memory and the Social Shape of the Past. Chicago, IL: Univ. of Chicago Press.
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.7208/chicago/9780226924908.001.0001