{"id":1601,"date":"2018-01-02T16:36:15","date_gmt":"2018-01-02T16:36:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thefhguide.com\/blog\/?p=1601"},"modified":"2019-01-16T19:07:36","modified_gmt":"2019-01-16T19:07:36","slug":"ideas-and-help-for-using-social-media-the-new-language-of-family-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thefhguide.com\/blog\/ideas-and-help-for-using-social-media-the-new-language-of-family-history\/","title":{"rendered":"Ideas and Help for Using Social Media – “The New Language of Family History”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Social media has been referred to as “the new language of family history,” and The Family History Guide is here to help anyone learn to speak it! In addition to suggestions found in\u00a0Social Media Activities for Youth,<\/a>\u00a0Families,<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Individuals,<\/a> more tools for learning and using social media for family history are listed in\u00a0Project 7, Goal 3<\/a>\u00a0(FamilySearch) or Project 6 Goal 3<\/a>\u00a0for Ancestry, MyHeritage, or Findmypast. For many people in our modern world, social media is the preferred platform for sharing stories. In an article entitled,\u00a0\u00a0Social Media: Real-time Family History in the First Person<\/a>, Steven and Jill Decker explain that\"\" “Never has so much first-person family history been contributed by so many \u2013 and most do not even realize they are doing it. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and other social media outlets are forces that can be utilized to document and share a family\u2019s history in the here and now. They are modern methods to journal our activities and, unlike handwritten diaries and journals, they are accessible to multiple \u201cfriends\u201d or \u201cfollowers\u201d at the same time. Often the history is accompanied by photographs.” With social media available in so many forms, blogger Ellen Bahr asks the question, “Shouldn’t we be taking advantage of it?” She discusses the ways we can tap into social media resources in her article\u00a0\u00a0hashtags, Tweets, and Blogs: The New Language of Family History<\/a>, beginning with an introduction describing how family history technology has advanced so dramatically in the last few decades:<\/p>\n

“In the comfort of our own homes we can now research our ancestors\u2019 names, expand our family trees, search through archives of photos, explore countless genealogical websites, do indexing, download digital images, upload stories of our ancestors, and share instantly what we find with family members who live thousands of miles away, to name just a few. We can even \u201ctweet\u201d about it to our friends, blog about it, or post our finds on Facebook and Instagram.” She also advises that if you don’t know how to use it,\u00a0you just need to “ask your children, your grandchildren, or the teenager next door to tell you. Chances are they\u2019ll be happy to bring you up to speed and teach you how to use this new technology.”<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I know that my grandchildren are often my “go-to” helpers when it comes to using social media! Ellen also shares some helpful ideas from Hannah Z. Allan for sharing our stories on social media:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Facebook<\/strong><\/p>\n