ABSTRACT
This conclusion engages the way genealogy and genetic identity are implicated in how memoirists understand racial identity and belonging. Genealogical research has been considered tangential to life writing yet for the writers considered here—including Shirlee Taylor Haizlip, Lise Funderburg, Mat Johnson, and Danzy Senna—the non-narrative life writing practice of building family trees and taking a DNA test is intertwined with the legacies of passing, the nuances of race and racial identification, and the construction of genetic identity, ultimately raising the question of how the “one-drop rule” can persist in light of the specificity of genetic identity.
