Year: 2019

Findagrave Shenanigans

Findagrave Shenanigans

by Justin Durand

I’m increasingly convinced Findagrave is moving toward a naked power grab of our data. I learned this week that they have no scruples about taking away “added by” credit and giving it to someone else. Dates don’t actually matter.

The point of altering the facts seems to be rewarding the people who add masses of information at the expense of those who just add a few memorials here and there.

Here’s what happened to me. There’s a cemetery plot that has three graves in it—my step-mother and two step-brothers. The three of them share one grave marker. I added two of the memorials, then months later another user added the same memorials. Then on the third grave, she added the memorial first, and I added a duplicate without noticing.

There is no doubt that they were duplicates. This other user even added her photos to the memorials I had created.

When I requested a merge, Findagrave reversed the order of the merges so the other user got credit for adding them. Why? According to their email, it was because I had edited the memorials I created. Presumably they don’t like people adding things like obituaries and relationships.

I complained. And they came back saying essentially, “No, ignore our email. That wasn’t the reason.” The real reason, they said, was because of some confusion (on both our parts) whether the graves are in the main cemetery or in one of the sub-cemeteries. Since the other user added two of her three in the sub-cemetery she wins the credit. I had all three correct now but I had originally added them to the main cemetery so it didn’t count.

The tone deafness here is staggering. I don’t want to actually name names here since the other user didn’t do anything wrong. She’s added masses of memorials. One might wonder why she didn’t notice that the same marker was probably not located in two different cemeteries, but she didn’t. Findagrave did, though, and used it as a pretext to take my family memorials away from me and give them to a stranger.

The other user was exceptionally kind, as ordinary users often are. She transferred management of the memorials to me. And she still keeps photo credit. Nothing she can do about Findagrave giving her credit for adding the memorials.

I think the one thing I can do now that I’m aware I can lose credit for my work at any time is focus my efforts on Billiongraves instead.

Crackers

Crackers

by Justin Durand

I think probably the first time I heard the term Cracker was in Gone With the Wind. Maybe it’s a Southern word. I don’t think I’ve ever heard it used by a Westerner, at least not un-self-consciously. Many people I’ve asked have no idea what it means even though most have heard it.

I read Gone With the Wind in high school, and got the basic meaning from the context and from asking around. A Cracker is a backwoods Southerner; poor, illiterate, and bigoted.

But really I learned about Crackers in a college history class. We had a professor who tried to give us some depth, something more than just events.

One of the things he told us, several times and in several ways, is that those of us from rural Western backgrounds come from a uniquely blended culture. He made it sound special.

Our cowboy culture and country music have roots in the rural South, as indeed we do ourselves in many cases, but our politics have been shaped by 100 years of Yankee schoolmarms. In short, our ancestors didn’t lose the Civil War, so we have a variant of rural Southern culture but with a dash of New England liberalism and without the chip on our shoulders.

Do I need to say it? Of course, this is a generalization. There are exceptions. Back then I thought my Utah Mormon background made me one of the exceptions. Nowadays, I don’t buy that that for a minute.

My professor was really talking about Crackers, although it would not have been politic to call them that.

After college, as a genealogist, I learned to recognize Crackers as being the descendants of 18th century Ulster Scot immigrants. They love God, guns, and now Trump.

Fischer developed this idea further. His idea was that immigrants from northern Britain (“the Borderlands”) 1715-1775 settled in America’s “Backcountry”, becoming one of the four British folkways that contributed to American culture. Crackers.

I have quite a bit of Ulster Scot ancestry, so I’ve been almost endlessly interested in the topic. Barry McCain posted an article yesterday. I always sit and pay attention when it’s him. For this article, I have three take-aways:

  1. A nice summary: “They were basically a semi nomadic group who were excellent hunters, kept free range cattle and pigs, and lived in the backcountry. They were normally of Ulster ancestry, but not exclusively so.” And, “The original Crackers are also associated with free range cattle and lived in the backcountry.“
  2. McCain thinks the word “Cracker is the anglicised form of Creachadóir”, which in Ulster and Scots Gaelic means a “raider and freebooter”, but is “also associated with the free range cattle drovers in Ulster.” Same thing to the Elizabethan English, he says. I think he’s likely right about this. Until now I’ve accepted the theory Cracker is an anglicized form of Cracaire. They’ll talk your ear off. McCain considers this idea but he thinks the Gaelic usage is too recent.
  3. Contrary to my impression (and contrary to Wikipedia), McCain says the word Cracker is not derogatory. In fact, it’s a term of pride. He says: “It means you are indigenous to the South, ancestors from Ulster or northwest Britain, have roots in the Uplands or Backcountry, are independent, self-reliant, you act in an honorable way, are good with weapons, hunting, fishing, and are a man who knows how to do things.  As the Southern Crackers settled Texas and the Southwest they became the Cowboy, a cultural continuum of their unique lifestyle.”

I hope it’s true the word Cracker is no longer offensive, but I’m skeptical.

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Society for Creative Anachronism

Society for Creative Anachronism

by Justin Durand

Ken Mondschein at Medievalists.net is saying good things about the SCA. No objections here, but it has me wondering how many medievalists have belonged to the Society of Creative Anachronism at some point. I did. Kind of. Maybe it would be more accurate to say I stopped by from time to time.

I don’t think I can pin down a start date. Probably 1982 or 1983 in Shire of Loch Salaan (Salt Lake City). I can’t remember now whether I saw a notice at Cosmic Airplane, or whether we were just driving by the park (which park?) and happened to see them. Which park? Wasn’t Liberty Park. Had to be Sugar House. What I remember more clearly is that I struggled to come up with an appropriate costume. My early attempts were an ongoing annoyance to a certain woman, who nevertheless continued to believe I would be interested in her constant stream of trivia about weaving in the Middle Ages.

Then on and off through the years. Never very far but neither very close. The last serious bit was about 1997 or 1998 in the Kingdom of the Outlands, with a last cursory bit about 2005 in the Canton of Hawks Hollow, when I finally registered my name as Juste de Beauharnais, a persona I had nurtured for some time. (I would have said it was 2002 but I looked it up and it’s 2005.)

There was another persona before that but I’m not remembering. Jamie Hamilton? Maybe. Probably. And a persona, something to do with Orkney, but that one is so far distant I doubt there’re any traces anywhere inside my skull.

I think of SCA as a path not taken. About 20 years start to finish, although saying “20 years” might give the wrong impression. It was all duration and very little depth.

I went for a more clearly academic path. No matter how much I might in principle like the idea of a medievalism that is both popular and accessible, in practice most of it drove me nuts. Too pretentious. And by that, I mean even more pretentious than academia.

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Edited to removed broken links.

A Better Diaspora

A Better Diaspora

by Justin Durand

What does it mean — a better diaspora? I started thinking about this a couple of weeks ago when a friend who is Latina mentioned how often people are surprised when they find out she doesn’t speak Spanish.

At the time I just laughed. I don’t speak Swedish or any of my other ancestral languages, so we’re in the same boat.

Later, though, I started thinking. Why would people think Latinxs would be more likely to retain an ancestral language than anyone else?

Historically, most of the United States has been part of the European diaspora. Learning to speak English is a benchmark for assimilation. Yet, there are cultural enclaves everywhere. I’ve lived in Salt Lake City, New York, and Denver. In each of them I lived for a time in particular cultural areas, including Latinx, Russian, German, and Jewish. Now I live on the edge of the Muslim part of Denver.

When I hear the news about Americans who hate immigrants, I think to myself these people must have led very sheltered, small-town lives. In the cities, immigrant communities are just part of life. Their native cultures give us new restaurants and cultural festivals, which are part of the joy of living in a city.

While all this was fresh in my mind, I came across an old Michael Newton article. If you’re not familiar with his work, he’s been called “a leading authority on the literature and cultural legacy of Scottish Highland immigrant communities in America.” I’ve been giving up on him, because he’s retreating behind a paywall but I still read him when I come across something.

Newton argues that most of what passes for Scottish culture in North America — kilts, clans & whisky — is a sham and sometimes even a vehicle for white supremacy. In this “new” article, he is promoting learning Scots Gaelic as a way of improving the Scottish diaspora.

The idea of learning Scots Gaelic as a way of strengthening the culture of the diaspora strikes me as interesting. Despite what I told my Latina friend about not speaking Swedish, I did take a semester in college. I also had high school French and German, and college Latin, German (and Swedish). And, I’ve tried now and then, but without much success, to learn Gaelic and Old Norse.

So, I wonder. Is knowing the language an essential part of affirming identity and belonging? I think I’d want to read a wider spectrum of opinion and debate but it feels like there’s something “there”.

More Information

  • Dr. Michael Newton. “A Better Scottish Diaspora is Possible.” Patreon <patreon.com/posts/27706625>, July 17, 2019. Retrieved May 27, 2020. 

Updated May 27, 2020 to replace the Patreon link, which works but is “Forbidden”.