{"id":748,"date":"2010-03-31T15:15:00","date_gmt":"2010-03-31T20:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/my-take-on-nbcs-who-do-you-think-you-are-series\/"},"modified":"2013-07-10T00:33:46","modified_gmt":"2013-07-10T05:33:46","slug":"my-take-on-nbcs-who-do-you-think-you-are-series","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/my-take-on-nbcs-who-do-you-think-you-are-series\/","title":{"rendered":"My Take on NBC\u2019s Who Do You Think You Are? Series"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I have faithfully watched the first four episodes of NBC\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nbc.com\/who-do-you-think-you-are\/about\/index.shtml\">Who Do You Think You Are?<\/a> series, and will watch the final three when the air.\u00a0 Overall, I find the episodes engaging and I always learn something.\u00a0 But something was bugging me, and I think I&#8217; finally figured out what.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Because the show is not geared specifically to the professional or advanced genealogist,\u00a0 methodology is really not shown, and I\u2019m okay with that.\u00a0 I feel the purpose of the show is to get people interested in learning more about their family history, and by focusing on the interesting stories of well-known celebrities, it will likely draw people in to both the show and in pursuing their own histories.<\/p>\n<p>I watched a few of the episodes with my husband, and I found myself saying, \u201cIt\u2019s really not that easy.\u201d\u00a0 Again, I get the purpose of the show, but at the same time, they make it look so easy that I\u2019m afraid people will get discouraged once they start to explore their roots and realize it\u2019s not as easy as the show makes it out to be.\u00a0 But that wasn\u2019t really the thing that bugged me the most.<\/p>\n<p>While I understand that it is necessary to conduct research in the area where your ancestors lived, I also know this is not always possible.\u00a0 Time and money often prevent us from actually visiting the areas ourselves so sometimes you have to rely on other means to obtain such information, like films from FHL, contacting county or town clerks, and perhaps finding a local researcher.\u00a0 That\u2019s what irks me about the show.\u00a0 A clue is uncovered, and bam\u2026off to the next location.\u00a0 While it\u2019s interesting to see the places they visit and the information they uncover while there, I would think this would discourage many people from wanting to explore their family&#8217;s history, as I\u2019m sure most don\u2019t have the time or money to do that kind of research.\u00a0 So while the show is aimed at encouraging people to explore their own ancestry, at the same time, it may be discouraging them given the current format.<\/p>\n<p>In one breath, they make it seem so easy; you blink and you have a new clue or an answer.\u00a0 But in another breath, they present it in a manner that leads one to believe you can only find the answers by hopping on a plane each time you find a new clue.\u00a0 Don\u2019t get me wrong, it&#8217; certainly makes the stories more interesting when you see the actual places and see the person\u2019s experience in that place.\u00a0 But is that the reality of genealogy research for the average person?\u00a0 Probably not.\u00a0 For most of us, it\u2019s probably more renting FHL films; corresponding with employees of archives, county courthouses, and libraries; and maybe even working with a researched in the area of interest.<\/p>\n<p>Regardless of my opinion on the matter, I still think it\u2019s a great show.\u00a0 The variety or stories is fantastic, from New England history (including witch trials), to slave ancestry, to Jewish heritage, to war heroes.\u00a0 I think it\u2019s helping people learn about history in general and will encourage people to seek out their own family histories.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I have faithfully watched the first four episodes of NBC\u2019s Who Do You Think You Are? series, and will watch the final three when the air.\u00a0 Overall, I find the episodes engaging and I always learn something.\u00a0 But something was bugging me, and I think [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-748","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-genblog","cat-25-id"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3HcLI-c4","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=748"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3652,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748\/revisions\/3652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}