Course: 2027-08
Inclusive Genealogy: Navigating Complex Family Trees
Virtual via Zoom | 21-25 June 2027 | Registration opens 3 February, 2027, 1:00 pm ET
Faculty:
Coordinator and Instructor: Carly Lane Morgan, JD
Other Instructors: André Kearns; Stewart Blandón Traiman; Dr. Katharine O’Connell; Rev. Kate Penney Howard; Grant Din
Tuition:
• Regular Price: $615
• NGS Member Price: $575
Description:
Family history is rarely as simple as the traditional pedigree chart suggests. Families are shaped by adoption, illegitimacy, divorce and remarriage, migration, race, religion, gender, sexuality, disability, poverty, changing laws, social expectations, and countless other circumstances that affect both how people lived and how their lives were recorded.
Inclusive Genealogy: Navigating Complex Family Trees explores the research challenges that arise when our ancestors and their families do not fit neatly into conventional genealogical frameworks. Through practical methodology, historical context, and case studies, students will examine how identity, family structure, social status, and historical circumstances can shape the records we find, the records that are missing, and the conclusions we draw from them.
Sessions will address complex parentage and family relationships, conflicting and absent records, marginalized and underdocumented populations, difficult or sensitive family histories, and the assumptions researchers may unknowingly bring to their work. Students will learn strategies for recognizing gaps and biases in the historical record, evaluating evidence in complicated cases, expanding research beyond familiar sources, and documenting family relationships accurately and thoughtfully.
Objectives:
Identify assumptions about family structure, identity, and relationships that can influence genealogical research and interpretation; (2) Evaluate conflicting, incomplete, or absent evidence involving complex family relationships and historically underdocumented individuals; (3) Apply research strategies for investigating families and individuals whose experiences may not be adequately represented in traditional genealogical sources; (4) Analyze historical, legal, cultural, and social contexts that affected how family relationships and identities were created, recorded, and understood; (5) Develop well-supported genealogical conclusions that accurately and sensitively represent complex families and individual life experiences.
Student Prerequisites:
None
Recordings:
Sessions will be recorded and available through July 9, 2027.
NOTE: All times are listed in Eastern Time.
Live Sessions may be subject to schedule adjustments by your course coordinator.
| Day | Session | Time | Session Title | Description | Instructor | |||||
| M | 10:10-30 | Welcome and Orientation | Morgan | |||||||
| M | 1 | 10:30-11:45 | Parentage in Genealogy | This presentation focuses on determining parents in genealogy. We will cover why it’s essential to record all parent relationships accurately, even if those relationships challenge historical models and rules of parentage in family history. This presentation will give students an overview of the coming week and lay the foundation for creative research strategies for locating parents and defining their role in the tree. | Morgan | |||||
| M | 2 | 12:00-1:115 | Conflict in Parentage Records | This presentation focuses on resolving conflicts in records of parentage. We will cover common reasons for conflicts and how to weigh evidence to identify parents accurately. By examining and resolving real cases, we’ll practice analysis and align our methods with the Genealogical Proof Standard. This presentation will help students determine if the parent they’ve found is the parent that belongs on the tree. | O’Connell | |||||
| M | 3 | 2:15-3:30 | Parentage and Poverty | This presentation examines how poverty shaped relationships between parents and children and complicated the records genealogists use to reconstruct families. We will explore temporary placements, shifting households, institutional care, and other circumstances in which children lived apart from their parents without permanently severing those relationships. Students will learn to use poor relief, institutional, court, and other social records to identify and document parentage when traditional family records do not tell the whole story. | Morgan | |||||
| M | 4 | 3:45-5:00 | Paper Families and Chinese American Parentage | During the Chinese Exclusion Acts from 1882-1943 and beyond, it was difficult for Chinese immigrants to come to this country. Especially after the San Francisco earthquake and fire of 1906 destroyed the Hall of Records, many Chinese men in the U.S. claimed to have U.S. birth and to have fathered children, known as “paper sons” or “paper daughters,” when they were in China. Knowing this, the U.S. government put Chinese immigrants through a difficult interrogation process. How can researchers find the real story behind these families? | Din | |||||
| T | 5 | 10:30-11:45 | People without Parents | This presentation focuses on people without parents. We will cover research hurdles faced in cases of orphans, displaced children, and children with only one recognized parent. We will also discuss the choice of removing a parent from one’s history and genealogists’ responsibilities to record history accurately. This presentation will help students construct family trees that don’t follow the typical two-parent structure. | Morgan | |||||
| T | 6 | 12:00-1:115 | Illegitimacy | This presentation focuses on children with biological parents who are/were not married to each other. We will cover a history of illegitimacy and the family tree and how to recognize illegitimacy in records through verbiage and social clues. By looking at real cases, we’ll identify strategies to determine biological parentage in cases of illegitimacy. We will also discuss how the treatment of their illegitimacy in a person’s lifetime might affect how we build that story in our family history. | Morgan | |||||
| T | 7 | 2:15-3:30 | Parentage Under Slavery | This presentation will examine the challenges of identifying the biological parents of children born into slavery—including parents who were enslaved and those who were enslavers. We will explore clues in historical records and DNA evidence that can help establish parentage, consider how these relationships should be represented in the family tree, and discuss our responsibilities as genealogists to both historical truth and living descendants. | Kearns | |||||
| T | 8 | 3:45-5:00 | When Parentage Reveals Sexual Violence: Trauma-Informed Genealogical Practice | Genealogical research can uncover sexual violence through court records, DNA results, family testimony, institutional files, and long-kept silences. These discoveries require more than sound research; they require care. Participants will learn practical approaches to pacing research, communicating discoveries, protecting privacy, offering clients meaningful choices, recognizing their own emotional responses, and knowing when referral to additional support is appropriate. | Howard | |||||
| W | 9 | 10:30-11:45 | People with Many Parents | This presentation introduces hurdles that arise from an abundance of parentage (people with more than two parents). We will cover the historical treatment of multiple parents in genealogy and how we record multiple parents on the family tree today. | Morgan | |||||
| W | 10 | 12:00-1:115 | Adoption | This presentation focuses on adoption. We will cover how adoption can be organized on the family tree, which adoption records to look for, and clues that an ancestor may have been adopted quietly in our family history. This presentation will help students determine accurate parent relationships in adoption cases. | Sexton | |||||
| W | 11 | 2:15-3:30 | Stepparents | This presentation focuses on the parent relationships of stepparents. We will cover how to identify stepparents and clues about the stepparent relationship and its significance in a person’s life. By researching the stepparent relationship, we can more accurately construct the parent relationship in our storytelling | Morgan | |||||
| W | 12 | 3:45-5:00 | Mary Ann, A Plural Wife: Mormon Polygamous Ancestors Through a Historical Lens | This presentation focuses on the history and challenges of 19th-century Mormon polygamy. We will cover essential resources, such as church records, censuses, and family journals, while providing context around the cultural, social, and religious dynamics that shaped polygamous families in early Mormon communities. By integrating historical insights, we’ll uncover societal forces influencing their lives. We will also examine genealogical research challenges with these families, including lack of records, imprisonment, and endogamy. This presentation will help students better understand 19th-century alternative lifestyles and how those influence today’s families. | Philibert-Ortega | |||||
| Th | 13 | 10:30-11:45 | Complex Parentage | This presentation introduces new complexities in parentage. We will cover advances in science and changes in social culture that have created new parentage records. We will also discuss the challenges faced using traditional methods to record modern families. This presentation will help students build family trees that are flexible enough to reflect all parent relationships. | Morgan | |||||
| Th | 14 | 12:00-1:115 | LGBTQ+ Parents | This presentation focuses on LGBTQ+ parentage. We will cover changes in U.S. law that led to different records and recognition of the parent relationship. We will also take a brief look at the status of LGBTQ+ family recognition and records internationally. | Blandon Traiman | |||||
| Th | 15 | 2:15-3:30 | Genetic Donors | This presentation will discuss genetic donors as part of genealogy. We will cover a timeline of scientific advancements, records associated with genetic donation, and how we can include genetic donors in the family tree | Blandon Traiman | |||||
| Th | 16 | 3:45-5:00 | Transgender Parents | This presentation focuses on transgender parentage and how genderqueer parents affect the paper trail. We will cover a brief history of transgender people navigating life in America, a vocabulary lesson on common transgender terms, and record changes associated with transgender people. We will also look at best practices to accurately record the parent role and relationship. | Morgan | |||||
| F | 17 | 10:30-11:45 | DNA and Parentage | This presentation focuses on DNA and parentage. We will cover using DNA clues and handling unexpected discoveries that establish or disrupt parent relationships. | Blandon Traiman | |||||
| F | 18 | 12:00-1:115 | Delivering complex family histories | This presentation focuses on what happens after we uncover a complex family history: how we share it. We will explore ways to translate difficult or complicated research into books, presentations, videos, family trees, and other formats for a range of audiences. Students will consider how much context a story requires, how presentation choices can shape its meaning, and how to balance historical accuracy with privacy and sensitivity when living people are affected. | Morgan |