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Subject: [APG] Cluster Genealogy
Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 10:52:28 EST
As an Anthropologist and Genealogist, I can say that what
Anthropologists talk about is usually patterns. Particularly for us
Archaelogists, what we are looking for are any small scraps of information,
ie artifacts, to try to connect one site to another; one culture to another.
We use things like cluster analysis to try to recognize the patterns.
In genealogy, the patterns are easier to see if we look for them.
Census records give places, or at least states of origin, so we have two
things, surnames and states. And make no mistakes, a small group of loosely
related families from Hampshire County, MA migrating to a town in Ohio and
living next to a small group of loosely related families from New Jersey will
have different cultural patterns. The two groups will meld together in time,
but initially the interactions will be very in-group.
I usually find that you start with the family you're researching, find
the related families, and then can see the larger patterns which are
particularly enlightening.
Don't know if this is any help.
Barbara Vander Leest PhD
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