Genealogy is a pursuit of clarity—piecing together our past, connecting names, dates, and stories into a meaningful whole. But how we communicate those connections can be just as important as the research itself. Without clear, consistent language, our findings can become tangled, confusing, or even misleading.
One of the greatest pain points in genealogy communication is the great-great-great problem—how do we refer to distant ancestors without making our writing (or speech) cumbersome and hard to follow? This isn’t just a small issue—it’s a universal challenge. Over 54,000 people have visited my blog post on this very topic. I posted that nearly nine years ago and 500 more genealogists still find their way to that post every month! And I wonder how many more are frustrated by the lack of a consistent standard, but never find the post.
Genealogists almost always become communicators—if not in writing or public speaking, then in telling the stories to descendants. Developing best practices makes all the difference in your effectiveness. And if there is not a group “best practice” for a particular pain point, create a personal one.
Why Communication Best Practices Matter
When we establish best practices for how we communicate genealogy, we gain three essential benefits:
- Saving Time – Every time you have to stop and figure out how to phrase something, you’re losing time that could be spent on research or analysis. Once you establish a rule—whether it’s how you refer to an ancestor or how you format citations—you don’t have to stop and rethink it every time.
- Ensuring Consistency – Communication inconsistency can be frustrating for both the communicator and the audience. Have you ever written about an ancestor one way in one place, then formatted it completely differently somewhere else? Consistency in style and terminology makes our work cleaner and easier to follow, whether we’re writing a family history, a blog post, or just our own research notes.
- Making It Easy to Understand – Genealogy research is complex enough without adding confusion through unclear communication. When we standardize how we refer to ancestors, places, and records, we make our work more accessible not just to others, but also to our future selves when we return to notes months or years later.
The Great-Great-Great Example
The great-great-great dilemma illustrates the value of establishing best practices. Writing out “great-great-great-great-grandfather” every time becomes unwieldy fast. Some people use “ggg-grandfather,” others shorten it with numbers (e.g., “3rd-great-grandfather”). Until you decide on a system, you’re left rethinking it every time. The sheer number of genealogists searching for answers on this topic proves that many are looking for a better way.
The solution? Pick a format and use it consistently. If you’re writing for a genealogy journal, follow their specific style rules. But for personal use, research logs, or public sharing, take the time now to decide on a best practice that works for you and stick with it.
If you are not aware of the best practice I recommend for the great-greats, I’ve created a new video to speed you to the answer:
Your Turn: What Communication Challenges Have You Faced?
The great-great-great problem is just one example of how genealogy communication can become a stumbling block. What about you? Have you ever found yourself losing time because you didn’t have a clear style? Have you struggled with inconsistencies in how you present research? Have unclear terms ever confused your audience or yourself when revisiting old notes?
Use the comments below to share your experiences. Let’s talk about where a lack of a clear style or best practice has cost you time—or where adopting a system has made your genealogy research and communication easier.
By identifying pain points now and deciding on best practices, we set ourselves up for clearer, more efficient research—making genealogy more rewarding not just for us, but for those who come after us.
Hi Donna, The great-great-great naming convention is a simple example for sure but represents the tip of the iceberg as far as things go. The general answer to achieving best practice is about having a consistent, systemised approach that is shared in common with practitioners. Lots has been written, but still there is lots chaos. So here a few things I can share:
a) approach to great-great problem is simply to use single capital for generation e.g. GG for great-great, or GGG for great-great-great.
b) organise the potentially thousands of digital files in a simple way before using any tools: i) name files consistently: I use convention YYYY-MM-DD—-.. This helps me organise, sort and filter. ii) place files in folders for relevant people where each folder is also named according to a convention: I create an individual folder for each person according to a standard ,<first name(s) (birth year-death year). e.g. Smith, John (1900-1960). For females I adopt the western convention of , (birth year-death year) e.g. Jones (Smith), Mary (1902-1965).
c) Use a consistent approach for citations. This is easier said than done. If this is done using standard word processing, then ok. But crunch time comes when trying to use genealogical software programs that all appear to implement a different approach while claiming “best practice or standards approach”. It is so common an experience that data loss occurs with exchange of data and information between genealogical programs because they interpret (GEDCOM) standards differently. And citations are an area that is compromised.
1. I use 4th-great-grandmother/father
2. for date formation my data base uses dd/mm/yyyy which I like; when I’m writing notes I use yyyymmdd, because I don’t always initially have a complete date.
3. The usage that I find annoying is not maintaining a woman’s maiden name. If I don’t have a maiden name, the married name that I have, I put in square brackets and I add additional married names in individual brackets.
blank_Mary_[Brown] (I found her married to John Brown)
blank_Mary_[Nelson]_[Brown] (I found her married to Elmer Nelson with Elmer’s Brown step-children)
Arnold_Mary_[Nelson]_[Brown] (I found her living with her brother Henry Arnold, Henry’s mother Molly Arnold, Henry’s nephews Stephen Nelson and Isaac Brown)
s Brown s