Finding Your Roots, Season 1: The Official Companion to the PBS Series

Commendation Quotes: Who am I? Why am I here? Where am I headed? These are all fundamental questions to which every human being, regardless of race, gender or background, wants answers. Professor Gates provides these answers to the people he profiles, but [Finding Your Roots] also encourage[s] viewers to explore their own family histories so they can know more about themselves.--Cal Thomas, "Washington Examiner" Commendation Quotes: An accessible and engaging book, "Finding Your Roots" is a veritable how-to guide for readers to explore their own past. Henry Louis Gates Jr. brings a wealth of genealogical research expertise to his interviews, which are witty, knowledgeable, and touching, made more so by the fact that Gates himself enters the stories, changing places with the interviewees to reveal something of his own personal experience. Throughout, Gates imbues the stories with a kind of intimacy that speaks to all of us in our personal journeys searching for our own histories. There's nothing else quite like it.--Ira Berlin, University of Maryland Review Quotes: "Of interest to avid genealogy buffs."--"Kirkus Reviews"Review Quotes: In telling these stories, Gates provides clues to readers of how they can conduct their own searches and the value to be found in immigration records and the 1870 census.--"Booklist" Review Quotes: Of interest to avid genealogy buffs.--"Kirkus Reviews" Review Quotes: A painstakingly researched genealogical tapestry weaving a wonderful tribute to America as a very culturally rich melting pot.--Kam Williams Table of Contents: Foreword / David Altshuler -- Chapter 1. Genetic Gumbo / Branford Marsalis, Harry Connick Jr. -- Chapter 2. The Long Arc of Freedom / John Lewis, Cory Booker -- Chapter 3. What's in a Name? / Barbara Walters, Geoffrey Canada -- Chapter 4. Redemption / Kyra Sedgwick, Kevin Bacon -- Chapter 5. The Children of Abraham / Rick Warren, Angela Buchdahl, Yasir Qadhi -- Chapter 6. From the Old World to the New / Robert Downey Jr, Maggie Gyllenhaal -- Chapter 7. Shadows / Samuel L. Jackson, Condoleezza Rice, Ruth Simmons -- Chapter 8. Crossings / Margaret Cho, Sanjay Gupta, Martha Stewart -- Chapter 9. Neither Slave nor Free / Wanda Sykes, John Legend, Margarett Cooper -- Chapter 10. In the Footsteps of Conquistadors / Michelle Rodriguez, Linda Chavez, Adrian Grenier -- Acknowledgments -- Index. Publisher Marketing: Who are we, and where do we come from? The fundamental drive to answer these questions is at the heart of "Finding Your Roots," the companion book to the PBS documentary series seen by 30 million people. As Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. shows us, the tools of cutting-edge genomics and deep genealogical research now allow us to learn more about our roots, looking further back in time than ever before. Gates's investigations take on the personal and genealogical histories of more than twenty luminaries, including United States Congressman John Lewis, actor Robert Downey Jr., CNN medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta, President of the "Becoming American Institute" Linda Chavez, and comedian Margaret Cho. Interwoven with their moving stories of immigration, assimilation, strife, and success, Gates provides practical information for amateur genealogists just beginning archival research on their own families' roots, and he details the advances in genetic research now available to the public. The result is an illuminating exploration of who we are, how we lost track of our roots, and how we can find them again. Review Citations:

Kirkus Reviews 08/01/2014 (EAN 9781469618005, Hardcover)

Ebony 09/01/2014 pg. 30 (EAN 9781469618005, Hardcover)

Booklist 09/01/2014 pg. 30 (EAN 9781469618005, Hardcover)

Library Journal 11/01/2014 pg. 98 (EAN 9781469618005, Hardcover)

Contributor Bio:  Gates, Henry Louis, Jr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. (Ph. D. Cambridge), is Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and Director of the W. E. B. Du Bois Institute for African and American Research, Harvard University. He is the author of Life Upon These Shores: Looking at African American History, 1513 2008; Black in Latin America; Tradition and the Black Atlantic: Critical Theory in the African Diaspora; Faces of America; Figures in Black: Words, Signs, and the Racial Self; The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of Afro-American Criticism; Loose Canons: Notes on the Culture Wars; Colored People: A Memoir; The Future of Race with Cornel West; Wonders of the African World; Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Man; and The Trials of Phillis Wheatley. His is also the writer, producer, and narrator of PBS documentaries Finding Your Roots; Black in Latin America; Faces of America; African American Lives 1 and 2; Looking for Lincoln; America Beyond the Color Line; and Wonders of the African World. He is the editor of African American National Biography with Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, and The Dictionary of African Biography with Anthony Appiah; Encyclopedia Africana with Anthony Appiah; and The Bondwoman s Narrative by Hannah Crafts, as well as editor-in-chief of TheRoot.com. Contributor Bio:  Altshuler, David Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher Jr. University Professor and Director of the W. E. B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research at Harvard University.