4 Genealogy Things You Need to Know This Morning, Tuesday, 29 Oct 2013

10/29/2013

Genealogy Need to Know, Tue, 29 Oct 2013

On Genealogy's Star, James Tanner answers the question, "Is looking in online databases 'real' research?" I agree with what I believe is the intent of his answer -- encouraging someone to do what they can do. However, I also think it depends on what someone means by "looking." Are you looking and evaluating or just looking, taking whatever is found at face value and creating a family tree from the information you find without considering its validity? Searching means to look for something and researching means to look at something in a systematic way and implies critically analyzing it. So whether you're researching online or offline, you're still researching. If you can't make it to an archives or a courthouse or you can't afford to order records, you should notate that down in your conclusions because that obviously affects your conclusions because you haven't been able to look for and look at everything in order to evaluate it. But you're still researching. And if you're placing it all online to collaborate, you might find a generous cousin who has already ordered the certificates or documents that you need, and they just might share them with you so you can analyze them and make some more conclusions. So carry on, Online Researcher. =)

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