African American Genealogy, Old Records/New Genetics

The University of Minnesota's Center for Bioethics will hold the first national meeting to bring together the diverse groups working to reconstruct African American genealogies and ancestries that were disrupted and destroyed by the trans-Atlantic slave trade. The first day of the conference will discuss the importance of disrupted ancestry to the African American community and efforts to use traditional genealogical tools to reconstruct this ancestry. The second day will focus on the feasibility of using voluntary DNA testing to supplement traditional genealogy to enable African-Americans to identify tribes, ethnic groups, or African regions of origin. This meeting will bring together scholars from a variety of disciplines, genetics and genealogical experts, historians, civil rights leaders, and ethicists to examine the range of issues involved. The conference will be nationally advertised to the genetics, civil rights, and bioethics communities. After the conference, the P.I. will direct efforts to disseminate this material to a variety of websites and undertake the publication of papers on the proceedings of this collaboration. The publication of papers and dissemination of material over the Internet will foster further public discussion of conference topics.