Derek,

I hear ya and agree up to a point.

African American genealogical research can certainly be difficult, particularly when we get back to the era of the peculiar institution called Slavery in researching our enslaved ancestors. We do hit brick walls and we do have to think outside of the box, but I believe these problems fall within the framework of a "standard" genealogical process.

I think "outside the box" means and what is noticeably different for us African American researchers are the record sets we need to become familiar with. And there are no single type of record set(s) for our ancestors during the Slavery period in America from the early 17th century up to the end of the Civil War. In many situations we have African ancestored ancestors that were enslaved and who became free from the early 1600's. Record sets for those ancestors may be significantly different from those used in the early to mid-19th century.

While it is true that our oldest traceable African ancestored relative probably traces back to a slave-owner that is the nature and history of our presence in America prior to the Civil War .... we came to America enslaved, or are the products of those did come here enslaved.

So I agree on the difficulty and creative thinking (outside the box), but I believe that difficulty/creativity are within the process of a normal and standard genealogical process.

Best Wishes & Continued Success,
Art

Art's Families & Other Folk
http://tinyurl.com/cmntbhe
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Derek wrote:
"I think our biggest problem as African American slave descendants, attempting to trace our history through the normal genealogical process is faughty.

We'll never be able to acomplish what we think is possible, tracing our ancestors that is... through standard genealogy. This process does not apply to African Americans. We think it does, but I'm sorry t tell you, that it does not.

Simply because our oldest tracable ancestors ends at each of our relative's owners. Their siblings, parents, and relatives were sold off, exchanged, or inherited by other owners. We will always hit what we call "brick-walls".

In order to get beyond this delima, we'll have to think way out of the box."