DNA and ethics
Replies: 2
DNA and ethics
 vancehawkins1952
(View posts)
|
Posted: 15 Jan 2006 2:09PM GMT |
Classification: Query
DNA testing poses new ethical delimmas for the genealogist. I first heard og FamilyTree DNA testing center and contacted them.
I have had a male -Y-chromosome test done on m Hawkins line. I did this because I had reached a dead end in 1837 and could not find the parents of my ancestor born in Alabama in tha year -- I searched every county and there was no Hawkins child orn in any of them that matches my Joshua Allen Hawkins -- NONE! In desperation I hoped my DNA would match someone elses -- but it doesn't -- BUT -- we deviate only one marker from many -- BUT (again) upon asking hte DNA experts, they said the one marker ew deviate is a very slow changing one, meaning my ancestors probably deviated from the others in urope before they ever came to America -- back to square one.
I can trace my mother very easily so I saw no need to test the mtDNA -- German and Scots-Irish.
But Dad's line is a mystery -- family stories of Amrican Indian ancestry. My genalogical researdches are inconclusive, but we have many Cherokee surnames and we have lines that go back to both the homelands of the Cherokee and of the Catawba. One ancestor livd in the best known Melungeon community there is -- Stoney Creek in SW Tn and his name is associated with them. Histoprical research is proving the Melungeons were Indians who were allied to the Catawba in colonial days.
Since the Y-Chromosome and hte mtDNA test will not show race except for the straight male or straight female line I thought I could not "prove" Indian ancestry. But since we can prove we have the right surnames, the right location and time frames where the Cherokee lived on one side, and the Catawba & their allies (called Piedmont Catawba or Piedmont Siouan) on Dad's other side, and since we can not find any conection to known Caucasian families that go back to Europe as well -- it can not be proven all of our ancestors were Caucasian, either. Anyone who meets us prsonally will know we have American Indian blood -- we look it -- we look mixed. But I grew tired of being insulted online by poeple who have never met us and say we are lying -- why would I do that?
Anyhow, I found another website -- GeneTree -- who perform another type of DNA test called Autosomal. hey test DNA markers specifically associated with various races of men. My test showed up Mostly Caucasian, ut it also showed we have both American Indian (which I already kneww but couldn't prove) and Sub Saharan African DNA (which I didn't know). Now many of hte Melungeon families are said to have an African component as well as American Indian, and Caucasian. FINALLY, when people say we are "faking it" I can show them these DNA results showing American Indian ancestry. I live in Oklahoma and can trace my first relation in indian Territory to 1815 (then part of Arkansas), and in Oklahoma to before theTrail of Tears to 1828, another line to 1832, my direct line returned in 1872, left for a few years to Texas and returned in the mid/late 1880s, this time to stay.
Ethics is a 2 way street. we might not be able to prove relationship to the Cherokee, but neithr can it be proven we are NOT Cherokee as we lived with them and that CAN be proven. We lived WHERE Catawba lived in the ast AND whre a handful of them came to live in the Choctaw Nation in Leflore County, Ok. We can prove a part of this family also lived in the first known and documented Melungeon community from 1797 to 1815 and it has been proven they are mixed with people known as the Piedmont Catawba. But we can NOT PROVE a Catawba ancester. Through DNA we can PROV we have American Indian ancestry -- but we can not probe it is Cherokee (as it might all be Catawba) and vice versa, we can not prove it to be Catawba as it might be Cherokee -- research implies it goes in both direction, with surnames, timeframes and locations going in both directions.
This is complicated to explain, and takes paragraphs to explain correctly. If I write a short verson and leave anything out, someone might say I am being deceptive, but it just takes so long to point out the logic of this train of thought and how I conclude what I do.
Anyhow, DNA testing has proven we have American Indian ancestry. I have always said it isn't much and we have never sought tribal membership, just sought our ancestors.
vance
I have had a male -Y-chromosome test done on m Hawkins line. I did this because I had reached a dead end in 1837 and could not find the parents of my ancestor born in Alabama in tha year -- I searched every county and there was no Hawkins child orn in any of them that matches my Joshua Allen Hawkins -- NONE! In desperation I hoped my DNA would match someone elses -- but it doesn't -- BUT -- we deviate only one marker from many -- BUT (again) upon asking hte DNA experts, they said the one marker ew deviate is a very slow changing one, meaning my ancestors probably deviated from the others in urope before they ever came to America -- back to square one.
I can trace my mother very easily so I saw no need to test the mtDNA -- German and Scots-Irish.
But Dad's line is a mystery -- family stories of Amrican Indian ancestry. My genalogical researdches are inconclusive, but we have many Cherokee surnames and we have lines that go back to both the homelands of the Cherokee and of the Catawba. One ancestor livd in the best known Melungeon community there is -- Stoney Creek in SW Tn and his name is associated with them. Histoprical research is proving the Melungeons were Indians who were allied to the Catawba in colonial days.
Since the Y-Chromosome and hte mtDNA test will not show race except for the straight male or straight female line I thought I could not "prove" Indian ancestry. But since we can prove we have the right surnames, the right location and time frames where the Cherokee lived on one side, and the Catawba & their allies (called Piedmont Catawba or Piedmont Siouan) on Dad's other side, and since we can not find any conection to known Caucasian families that go back to Europe as well -- it can not be proven all of our ancestors were Caucasian, either. Anyone who meets us prsonally will know we have American Indian blood -- we look it -- we look mixed. But I grew tired of being insulted online by poeple who have never met us and say we are lying -- why would I do that?
Anyhow, I found another website -- GeneTree -- who perform another type of DNA test called Autosomal. hey test DNA markers specifically associated with various races of men. My test showed up Mostly Caucasian, ut it also showed we have both American Indian (which I already kneww but couldn't prove) and Sub Saharan African DNA (which I didn't know). Now many of hte Melungeon families are said to have an African component as well as American Indian, and Caucasian. FINALLY, when people say we are "faking it" I can show them these DNA results showing American Indian ancestry. I live in Oklahoma and can trace my first relation in indian Territory to 1815 (then part of Arkansas), and in Oklahoma to before theTrail of Tears to 1828, another line to 1832, my direct line returned in 1872, left for a few years to Texas and returned in the mid/late 1880s, this time to stay.
Ethics is a 2 way street. we might not be able to prove relationship to the Cherokee, but neithr can it be proven we are NOT Cherokee as we lived with them and that CAN be proven. We lived WHERE Catawba lived in the ast AND whre a handful of them came to live in the Choctaw Nation in Leflore County, Ok. We can prove a part of this family also lived in the first known and documented Melungeon community from 1797 to 1815 and it has been proven they are mixed with people known as the Piedmont Catawba. But we can NOT PROVE a Catawba ancester. Through DNA we can PROV we have American Indian ancestry -- but we can not probe it is Cherokee (as it might all be Catawba) and vice versa, we can not prove it to be Catawba as it might be Cherokee -- research implies it goes in both direction, with surnames, timeframes and locations going in both directions.
This is complicated to explain, and takes paragraphs to explain correctly. If I write a short verson and leave anything out, someone might say I am being deceptive, but it just takes so long to point out the logic of this train of thought and how I conclude what I do.
Anyhow, DNA testing has proven we have American Indian ancestry. I have always said it isn't much and we have never sought tribal membership, just sought our ancestors.
vance