The emotions of family history and the development of historical knowledge

ABSTRACT

This article will explore the relationship between the emotions of family history and the development of historical knowledge using surveys conducted with family historians in Australia, Canada and Britain since 2016. Many family historians begin to produce their family histories because they ‘owe’ their ancestors the benefit of their research skills, historical knowledge and the time it takes to reveal their life stories. Their emotional connection to the past is key to the development of their historical knowledge. I demonstrate some of the different ways in which family history allows researchers to use social history to link the past to the present in powerful ways, transforming individuals’ understandings of themselves and the wider world.

KEYWORDS:

• Family history
• history of the family
• history of emotions
• affect
• social history

Acknowledgments

Thank you to the family historians who shared their responses with me in surveys and oral history interviews. Thanks also to Melanie Nolan, Leigh Boucher, Noah Bassil, Paula Hamilton and Katie Barclay for commenting on earlier versions.

Disclosure statement

No, potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Julie Poulter, email correspondence, 26 April 2015.

2. Email correspondence with Marg Doherty, Secretary of the Australian Federation of Family History Organisations 20 August 2020. Similar data is reported from the Society of Australian Genealogists and the Society of Genealogists in Britain and the Ontario Genealogical Society.

3. Australian Survey response John Dean, 29 June 2016.

4. British Survey response 17 October 2016.

5. Australian Survey response, John Stanhope, 10 November 2016.

6. Australian Survey response John Bennett, 26 September 2016.

7. Canadian Survey response, Matthew Benson, 26 September 2016.

8. British Survey response 26 September 2016.

9. Australian Survey response, Jane Harding, 6 August 2016.

10. British Survey response, Peta McRae, 22 September 2016. See also, Australian Survey response, Lauren Brewer 22 September 2016; Australian Survey response, Mary Anderson, 24 September 2016; Australian Survey response, MN (anon) NG; Australian Survey response, Michaele Jeavons, 10 October 2016. See also Canadian survey response, Tina L Davis, 12 September 2016; Carole Turner Australian Survey response, NG; Canadian Survey response, Gail Lewis, 30 August 2016; Canadian Survey response, Donald Davis, 28 September 2016; Australian Survey response, Betty O’Neil, 21 August 2016; Australian Survey response, Catherine Ong, 15 July 2016.

11. Barbara Barclay Australian survey response 2016.

12. Jeanette Tsoulos Australian survey response 5 October 2016.

13. Canadian Survey response, Deb McAuslan, 29 September 2016.

14. Australian Survey response, Anne Cavenagh, 20 July 2016.

15. Australian Survey response, Helen Dell, 24 September 2016. See also Australian Survey response, Robyn Tassicker, 11 October 2016; Australian Survey response, Julanne Henessey, 13 October 2016; Canadian Survey response, Gail Roger, 29 August 2016; Australian Survey response, Lilian Magill, 12 July 2016.

16. Australian Survey response, Lilian Magill, 12 July 2016.

17. Australian Survey response, Jane Harding, 6 August 2016; See also, Australian Survey response, Gay Horsburgh, 24 August 2016. See also, British Survey response, Dea Leamey, 28 September 2016.

18. Australian Survey response, Anon MN, 2016.

19. Barbara Hearn survey response 9 October 2016.

20. British Survey response, Neil Hardie, 15 September 2016.

21. Christine Clifford survey response 16 October 2016.

22. Australian Survey response, Ron Sinclair, 22 August 2016.

23. Australian Survey response, Irene Morgan, 23 September 2016.

24. British Survey response, Dea Leamey, 28 September 2016; See also, Australian Survey response, Jenny Wilson, 25 July 2016; British Survey response, Christine Clifford, 14 October 2016; Australian Survey response, Marilyn Myers, NG.

25. Canadian Survey response, Carole Whelan, 4 September 2016.

26. Canadian Survey response, Glenna Morrison, 1 September 2016; Australian Survey response, John Dean, 29 June 2016; Australian Survey response, John Dean, 29 June 2016; Australian Survey response, John Dean, 29 June 2016; Australian Survey response, John Dean, 29 June 2016; Australian Survey response Ambra Sancin, 4 September 2016; Australian Survey response, Julie Jones, 25 August 2016; Australian Survey response, Karin Davis, 14 July 2016; Australian Survey response, Pennie Griffiths, NG.

27. Australian Survey response, Pennie Griffiths, NG.

28. Canadian Survey response, Lorri Busch, 5 September 2016.

29. Canadian Survey response, Donald Davis, 28 September 2016.

30. Canadian Survey response, Mary Jane Culbert, 27 September 2016.

31. Australian Survey response, Bob Lee, 23 September 2016. For other mentions of pride see Australian Survey responses Jenny Wilson 25 July 2016; John Dean, 29 June 2016; Les De Belin, ND, MN; Thais Hardman, 25 September 2016; Caroline Renfrey, 2 December 2016; Elizabeth Capelin, 3 August 2016; Christine Hutchison, 2 February 2017; TH, 11 October 2016; Catherine Ong, 15 July 2016; VM (anon) ng; Canadian: Marie Bentley Egglesfield, 12 January 2017.

32. Australian Survey response, 30 September 2016. See also Canadian Survey response, Linda Reid, 31 August 2016; Canadian Survey response, Gillian Leitch, 6 September 2016; Canadian Survey response, Richard Tank, 25 September 2016; Australian Survey response, Ian Devenish, 12 October 2016; Australian Survey response, Stephanie Hume, September 2016; British Survey response, Jill Gregory, 26 September 2016; Australian Survey response, 21 July 2016; Australian Survey response, Gay Horsburgh, 24 August 2016.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Tanya Evans

Associate Professor Tanya Evans is Director of the Centre for Applied History at Macquarie University in Sydney Australia where she teaches history. Her publications include: Fractured Families: Life On The Margins in Colonial New South Wales (University of New South Wales Press Ltd, 2015); with Pat Thane, Sinners, Scroungers, Saints: Unmarried Motherhood in Modern England (Oxford University Press, 2012); ‘Unfortunate Objects’: Lone Mothers in Eighteenth-Century London (Palgrave Macmillan, 2005); ‘Genealogy and Family History’, David Dean (ed.), Companion to Public History (Wiley Blackwell, 2018); ‘Who do you think you are?’ Historical Television Consultancy’, Australian Historical Studies, Autumn 2015. She also works as a consultant for Who do you think you are?