Quotes About Ancestry

My family, we're all WASPs.

Ever since I watched 'Roots,' I've dreamed of tracing my African ancestry and helping other people do the same.

I have never found out that there was in my family an artist or anyone interested in the arts or sciences, and I have never been sufficiently interested in my 'family tree' to bother. My father and mother had come to America on one of those great waves of immigration that followed persecution and pogroms in Czarist Russia and Poland.

Dad's Jewish and Irish, Mom's German and Scotch. I couldn't say I was anything. My last name isn't even Downey. My dad changed his name when he wanted to get into the Army and was underage. My real name is Robert Elias. I feel like I'm still looking for a home in some way.

In every country and region, there are practices and ways of living and culture that have been handed down from ancestors. Naturally, I feel that these should be respected.

In many ways, each of us is the sum total of what our ancestors were. The virtues they had may be our virtues, their strengths our strengths, and, in a way, their challenges could be our challenges.

History has always fascinated me. Coming from a family that has it's own regal history, I always like places that have a rich past.

Being in an area of the planet where scientists believe mankind started is quite amazing.

Imagine if you grew up in a place where your lineage was there for a hundred years, and part of the culture was to play music 50 percent of the time. You'd probably have a lot of musicians in your family too.

In African-American culture, there's often a family historian, someone who does the genealogy or keeps the family Bible. I became aware that might be one role the poet has.

Poets, I think, are born. You can't teach it. It's genetic - the circumstances of how you were raised... and there's probably some Irish in your blood lines.

Growing up in the U.S., music became a way for me to find my roots and anchor points.

Arsenal's past appeals to me - I like clubs with a history.

My mother always said I must be part Mongolian because of my lotus-pale complexion and squid-ink black hair.

Does anyone ask their parents how they are conceived?

Mitochondrial DNA is in higher concentration, lasts longer, and can be extracted from bones.

My mother played piano at home; she came from a musical family. Her father, who I never met, was a conductor and composer.

I think we really forget how connected we are to the past.

As a kid, I always felt connected to Africa; it was something I was very proud of.

I worry about children not having a sense of any direct connection to the past.

It's weird, the evolution of a person. You understand yourself, you understand your surroundings. Then, when you understand who came before you, once you understand that about yourself and the energy that you came to this planet with, you understand more about yourself.

I think any black woman is a queen. It's just, do you know it? Do you see it in yourself? Do you recognize it, do you abide by that, do you define yourself as that? Based on who we are and what we've been through and how we survive and where we stand, we are on kind of sacred ground. We stand on the backs of our ancestors.

My Swedish grandmother was the daughter of a dairy farmer who lived near Hedemora. My Swedish grandfather worked as a clerk for the Swedish railways in the Stockholm station.

My parents were both from extremely different backgrounds. My father's Italian, my mother was of Swedish descent. They're both first-generation Americans.