Anytime Talk of the Month for July
Forget the Family Tree. Tend Your Family Ivy! by Dai Davies of GenealCymru
Fear not the rabbit holes! Looking beyond your direct ancestors is actually a crucial part of developing a deep understanding of your family history and breaking down your brick walls. In this talk, Dai discusses the concept of the “family ivy"—those families that appear generation after generation on the margins of your family tree—and how best to use it. The Family Ivy is a concept that sits somewhere between the FAN method, pedigree collapse, and those pesky rabbit holes.
Dai Davies (they/them) is a professional genealogist, speaker, and writer with a passion for connecting people with their Welsh ancestors. The foundation of Dai’s approach is their background in anthropology—MA and BA (Hons)—which they use to explore themes of social identity, culture, and history. Dai’s personal family history research is focussed on rural south Wales, the farming class, literary culture, religious nonconformity, and migration. This Welsh research, which is notoriously challenging, is the starting point for Dai’s exploration of universal questions around how to break brick walls, develop new research methods, gain an in-depth knowledge of your ancestors, and thoughtfully tell the fullness of their stories. You can find much of Dai’s work for free on their blog (www.GenealCymru.com) or join the more than 1.3 million people who have watched the GenealCymru YouTube channel.
Free to our Members and Students via the login until 3rd August
£10 to guests Download the Talk
