Andrea Hanson anticipated her journey to Africa to be remodelative. She didn’t count on her transformation to start earlier than she even left JFK Airport.
A graduate scholar in social work, Hanson was headed to Ghana final December for a analysis internship. She was the one Black particular person from her college on the journey, however nearly everybody else boarding the aircraft to Ghana that day was Black.
“To see a whole space on the airport stuffed with Black folks — I had by no means skilled that earlier than,” she recollects. Her preliminary response was considered one of confusion. “It simply felt so overseas.”
Hanson is of West African descent, which she found by way of Ancestry.com’s DNA testing program. After a 12 months of deep private losses — her grandmother, mom, and brother had all just lately died — this journey to Ghana had private in addition to tutorial that means for her.
“In my household, your elders usher you into being an grownup,” she explains. “I didn’t have my elders. However my household believes we stroll with our ancestors — that they’re with you. So going to Ghana felt like not only a return for me however a return for them too.”
Arriving in Africa woke up in Hanson an awesome sense of connection to her roots — one she had craved however by no means skilled so intensely.
“I can’t clarify the sensation of seeing all these individuals who regarded like me,” she says, reflecting on the uncommon expertise of not being in a minority. “I felt secure. I felt like I used to be simply ‘Andrea,’ not ‘a Black lady.’”
A New Period in Ancestry Journey
Hanson’s response to arriving in Ghana is frequent for folks of the African diaspora returning to Africa, says Gina Paige, PhD, cofounder and president of African Ancestry. For 20 years, the group has used DNA testing to assist folks hint their household lineage not simply to common areas however to present-day African international locations and particular ethnic teams.
“Time and time once more I hear folks say, ‘I instantly felt like I used to be residence,’” notes Paige. “The emotions and the experiences are visceral.”
African People have been returning to Africa for generations. Within the Nineteen Fifties, Henderson Journey Service, the primary Black-owned worldwide journey company catering to African People, deliberate journeys for shoppers who needed to go to the continent. The company relied on a chartered aircraft to take its first group to rejoice Ghana’s independence in 1957.
The expertise of ancestry journey is completely different for African People than for People whose ancestors hail from, say, Europe.
“Black individuals are the unique victims of identification theft. We don’t know our names, we don’t know our languages, we don’t know who our ancestors are,” explains Paige. “So, not like an Irish one who is aware of that their household lived in this village and loved this life-style, and who can search for data within the native archives, we will’t do this due to slavery.”
All the identical, Paige believes touring to Africa could be a profound expertise.
“This is the reason what we do is so necessary and impactful: We inform folks the precise county and tribe they got here from,” she says. “Heritage journey is highly effective for Black folks as a result of it fills a void. It tangibly connects us to misplaced traditions, cultural practices, values, and spirituality.”
Welcoming Their Youngsters Residence
In 2019, the federal government of Ghana launched an initiative to ask African diasporans residence to Africa. Referred to as the Yr of Return, this system commemorated 400 years because the arrival of the primary documented enslaved Africans within the United States.
“Ghana is taken into account the gateway to West Africa,” Paige explains, and for many individuals returning to Africa, the journey begins there, the place so lots of their ancestors’ journeys into slavery started.
On the top of the slave commerce, Ghana was the “level of no return” for a lot of stolen Africans; greater than 40 “slave castles,” the place African folks have been offered to merchants and despatched throughout the Atlantic, lined the nation’s shoreline. Ghana’s ongoing Past the Return marketing campaign seeks to maintain the momentum of the 2019 program.
Hanson didn’t go to Ghana to take part in an official returning, however she nonetheless skilled a sense of return with every place she visited and every particular person she met.
“The primary time I went to the water, I acquired actually emotional,” Hanson recollects. “I don’t know if folks perceive how significant it’s to see the Atlantic Ocean from the opposite aspect, to acknowledge there’s somebody inside my lineage who by no means acquired an opportunity to look from this attitude once more.”
Hanson says her go to has without end modified the way in which she seems to be at her ancestors, and at herself.
“I bear in mind standing in one of many slave castles and feeling unhappy, after which offended — after which I simply had this large feeling of gratitude,” she recollects.
“I spotted I’m not just a few little Black lady who got here from slavery. My story is huge and large. I considered my ancestors, and I spotted you’ll be able to’t survive one thing like this and never be product of magic.”
Hanson intends to return to Africa along with her husband and youngsters, and she or he’s contemplating doing DNA testing by way of Paige’s group to study extra about her household’s lineage.
“There’s nonetheless a lot unknown,” she says. “I don’t have names. I don’t have photos. However I do know that is the place our story began.”
Have DNA Outcomes, Will Journey
The kind of DNA assessments you would possibly contemplate will rely on the extent of genetic data you’re searching for to enhance your ancestry journey expertise, explains Kyle Betit, senior genealogist and travel-program operations supervisor for ProGenealogists, the skilled companies division of Ancestry.
“The AncestryDNA take a look at is an autosomal DNA take a look at, which implies it’s taking a look at all your chromosomes — all your ancestors in your mom’s aspect and your father’s aspect of your loved ones tree,” Betit explains.
Autosomal testing gives a snapshot of your ethnicity indicating areas of the world the place your ancestors have been residing prior to now 1,000 years. Most autosomal testing companies provide an inventory of residing kin who’ve additionally examined with that service. AncestryDNA, for instance, maintains a database of twenty-two million folks, enabling you to search out kin and make connections.
“The opposite two sorts of assessments which are generally used are the Y-chromosome take a look at, which seems to be at your father’s father’s father’s line, and the mitochondrial DNA take a look at, which seems to be at your mom’s mom’s mom’s line,” Betit says.
Particularly, Y-chromosome testing for these assigned male at delivery identifies the Y-chromosome haplogroup, the traditional group of individuals from whom your patrilineage descends.
Mitochondrial DNA assessments hint your matrilineal ancestry by way of mitochondria, that are handed from moms to youngsters. African Ancestry makes use of these assessments to establish the international locations and tribes of their shoppers’ ancestors going again so far as 2,000 years.
After all, you’ll be able to take pleasure in a significant expertise visiting the lands of your ancestors with out taking a DNA take a look at or doing family tree analysis. However the extra you realize about your great-great-greats and past, the extra you’ll be able to uncover about not simply them however your self.