My family's AncestryDNA Genetic Communities

At RootsTech 2017 Tim Sullivan, CEO and president of Ancestry announced that Ancestry would be rolling out a new tool in March for those who have taken their AncestryDNA test(an autosomal test).  As the name suggests it groups your DNA matches into communities.  If you are interested in knowing more about all the research put into developing and the basis for this feature you can see that at the Genetic Communities: Whitepaper.

Expectations

What were my expectations?  In my own ancestry I have a great deal of colonial lines many of which settled in the southeastern United States.  Paternal lines I expect a good deal of English/Irish  represented in those matches.  Many of them were in Logan Co. KY, Union Co. SC and later Bedford, Rutherford and Williamson Co.,  TN.  My maternal lines are from the Isle of Man, England and Ireland.  In the states the concentration would be White, Warren and Van Buren Co TN area.  

For my daughter's ancestry my expectations were German and English with colonial communities in Georgia, East Tennessee, Alabama and Virginia.  She did have ancestors who immigrated a lot later than mine 1830s and 1890s and I expected to see communities for them in Florida and also Franklin Co Indiana.

For my sister's results I was expecting along the same lines as my own even though we have a lot of variation in what we inherited from our Dad.

Results for:

Me

Early Settlers of Northern Arkansas & Middle Tennessee--You and 466 of your DNA matches, along with 114,564 other AncestryDNA members, are all genetically linked to form the Genetic Community Early Settlers of Northern Arkansas & Middle Tennessee.

.....Settlers of the Ozarks & Middle Tennessee--You and 114 of your DNA matches, along with 9,988 other AncestryDNA members, are all genetically linked to form the Genetic Community Settlers of the Ozarks & Middle Tennessee.

Early Settlers of Tennessee & the Deep South--You and 709 of your DNA matches, along with 214,588 other AncestryDNA members, are all genetically linked to form the Genetic Community Early Settlers of Tennessee & the Deep South.

My Daughter
Early Settlers of Tennessee & the Deep South
Early Settlers of Northern Arkansas & Middle Tennessee
Early Settlers of Georgia & Florida

Mom
Early Settlers of Northern Arkansas & Middle Tennessee
....Settlers of the Ozarks & Middle Tennessee
Settlers of East Tennessee & the Blue Ridge Mountains
Settlers of Missouri Ozarks & East Tennessee




















My sister(full sibling)
Early Settlers of Northern Arkansas & Middle Tennessee
Settlers of Western Tennessee, Arkansas & Northeast Texas
.....Early Settlers of Tennessee & the Deep South
Early Settlers of Northern Alabama

Clicking on one of your Genetic Communities takes you to a Origins page which includes a timeline and a more close-up view of the area it covers.

From there selecting CONNECTION loads a page which has a list of your matches and the Top Surnames found in that community.

I'm sure this feature will be helpful to many people especially those who don't already know much about their ancestry and those who immigrated later on.  Keep in mind that I'm writing this from the perspective of someone using the US version of Ancestry with colonial American roots on both sides of the family.  The experience will be different for each person.  I feel like the communities are too broad right now to be of any significant help to me.  I'm hoping that will change as time goes on and we will be able to look at a more detailed group.  While I do like to see the Associated last names, I think a better option would have been to link those names to a search of your matches from that genetic community.  When I clicked on a name that was what I expected(Yes I didn't read the text up above the names before clicking).  Still, a great feature and I'm sure it will bring additional interest in researching both genetic and traditional ancestry.