When Genes Meet the Archives: How Genealogists in Germany, Austria and Switzerland Do (Not) Work with (a)DNA

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Elisabeth Timm
• Subject Area: Social and Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology
• Term: since 2026
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 559840299

Tracking down ‘kin’ of living and / or departed individuals by using (a)DNA analyses is not only on the agenda of archaeogenetics and the archaeologies. It also articulates in popular family history making that takes place around the archives. How do amateur genealogists in Germany, Austria and Switzerland assess, reject or use this new type of data? Since the 1980s, the search for ancestors in written sources boomed using new media and digital tools. While in popular genealogy all over the world it is quite common to combine (a)DNA and data from historical files to identify ‘origin,’ ‘race,’ or ‘ethnic identity,’ and while – not to mention the police – political and social movements especially in the postcolonial condition also refer to (a)DNA to claim and legitimize belonging, citizenship, cultural heritage or territory, activists in German language popular genealogy – that have not been investigated so far – also state reservations to do so: they doubt the epistemic value of (a)DNA, object the commodification of data from (a)DNA or from written sources, and are concerned about data privacy. By using approaches from the new kinship studies, a Foucauldian archaeology of knowledge, and a praxeographic method, the project will investigate this assemblage with a two-fold endeavour: first, an ethnography of genealogists’ dealing with (a)DNA in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland (PhD research), and second, a study (by the PI) to document and to analyse the resonance of ‘genetics’ and (a)DNA in popular genealogical periodicals that have been published in German since mid-twentieth century. Thus, the project will generate results in four fields: 1. Formats and circulation of (a)DNA in genealogists’ practice, 2. Their social profile and the occasions of their uses of this type of data, 3. Their ideas and practices concerning property and data privacy of ‘genes’ and ‘sources’, and 4. Their sensemaking and reasoning in favour of or against family history with (a)DNA. The project investigates the resonance of (a)DNA in popular genealogy in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland as a case that enriches our knowledge of the everyday appropriation of ‘genetics,’ and our knowledge of the popular linking of genetics and history since mid-twentieth century. The results, however, will not be interpreted as cultural traits of national containers, but understood as territorialized manifestation of a high-tech global form in the name of ‘kinship’ that is borne by lays who are engaging with genetic data and genetic knowledge. Therefore, the project proposed here with its ethnographic study and historical study wants to establish a perspective that understands popular genealogy and popular genetics as a twin phenomenon of making pasts, taking the German-language assemblage of it as an in-depth case study.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: Israel
• Cooperation Partner: Amir Teicher, Ph.D.