I want to go over the non-Sub Saharan African in my AncestryDNA Ethnicity Estimate. This is to show why parent-child DNA phasing is essential. The problems of not phasing becomes obvious if a person has a vast majority of specific continental ancestry that comes from parent that has tested.
I take ethnic analyses with a strong grain of salt and focus mainly on DNA relative matches. I do think that knowing the continental ancestries are helpful, but I am skeptical of the breakdown of each continental ancestry because of all the mixing that went on in people in the continents throughout history going back to highly ancient times. I am especially skeptical of the European continental breakdown with my longtime reading of the history of the mixing of populations in Europe.
After getting and reading 'Ancestry Reimagined: Dismantling the Myth of Genetic Ethnicities' by Kostas Kampourakis, I even question these ethnicity estimates even more. Kampourakis argues that DNA ancestry testing cannot reveal a person's true ethnic identity because ethnic groups are socially and culturally constructed. There is an explanation of the assumptions underlying the scientific study of ancestry, and the resulting paradoxes that are often overlooked. The study of human DNA mostly shows is that human DNA variation is continuous, and it is not possible to clearly delimit ethnic groups based on DNA data. As a result, we all are members of a huge, extended family, and not of genetically distinct ethnic groups. Every single human being is 99.9% genetically identical to another human being. There is far more genetic variation in population groups and continental groups than between them. Genetic variation is clinal. Africans are the most genetically diverse. The further out from Africa, the less diverse the populations are. Europeans are far less genetic diverse than Africans. Rather than clustering into distinct groups with clear boundaries, genetic traits change gradually across geography. Scientists call this pattern "clinal" variation.
My Genealogical Ancestry
I am a multicontinental American that is highly multiethnic, and I am related to many of my fellow Americans in many different ways. I am a 4th generation born Californian on my mother's side whose ancestry is mostly European. My African American father was a 7th generation born Louisianian.
The following is a breakdown of my ancestry by great grandparents.
My paternal grandfather's father was an African American born in Louisiana. He had some European ancestry. His other American roots were in District of Columbia, Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina.
My paternal grandfather's mother was an African American born in Louisiana. Her other American roots were in Georgia and Virginia.
My paternal grandmother's father was an African American born in Louisiana. He had some European ancestry. His other American roots were in Virginia, South Carolina, Kentucky, Georgia.
My paternal grandmother's mother was an African American born in Louisiana. She had some English, Acadian (French in what now known as Nova Scotia), Polish, Swiss, and German ancestry. Her other American roots were in Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina.
All of my paternal 3rd great grandparents were African American slaves in Louisiana with the exception of my paternal grandmother's maternal grandfather's father who was a European American son of an English American plantation owner born in North Carolinia and a 3/4 Acadian woman born in Louisiana.
My maternal grandfather's father was a Cape Verdean (Portuguese and Sub-Saharan African) American born in California. His parents were immigrants when Cape Verde was still a Portuguese colony.
My maternal grandfather's mother was born in California. Her ancestry was Puerto Rican (Spanish, Sub-Saharan African, and Taino) on her father's side and Madeiran (Portuguese with Sub Saharan African) on her mother's side. Her father was born in Puerto Rico. Her mother was born in Hawaii when it was still a kingdom. Her maternal grandparents immigrated to Hawaii.
My maternal grandmother's father was born in Oregon and was of Colonial European American that was mainly English ancestry with some German, Swiss, Scottish, Irish, Welsh, Dutch, and Frisian. His American roots were in Missouri, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Indiana, Tennessee, North Carolina, Alabama, Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut.
My maternal grandmother's mother was an Ashkenazi Jewish American born in Nebraska. Her father immigrated from Romania and her mother immigrated from an area in the Russian Empire that became Latvia.
Because of the Transatlantic Slave trade, I know very little about my African ancestry. Africa has over 3,000 ethnic groups, and that includes Nigeria having over 400 ethnic groups. My African ancestry is highly likely to consist of many African ethnic groups. I have some Indigenous American segments on my paternal chromosomes and not just my maternal chromosomes and X Chromosome. I have some Danish paternal DNA relative matches. From examining my European American paternal DNA relative matches, I learned that my father was a descendant of John Turner and his wife Patience Smith. John was the son of English American slaveowner Thomas Weathersbee and an unknown enslaved African American woman. Patience was the daughter of a European American woman named Rachael who had Irish ancestry and a man that was the son of a African American man and European American woman. Her husband John Turner was the son of English American plantation/slave Thomas Weathersbee Sr. and an enslaved African American woman. John was a slave due to his mother's status. Patience purchased John's freedom from his father for 60 pounds in Halifax County, North Carolina in 1769. They were already common law-married with sons at the time. Patience's free status made it possible for The Turner family to live as free people of color in Marion County, South Carolina. Most of John and Patience's children (including three sons and three or four daughters) had European American spouses. Through one of his enslaved African American 2nd great grandparents that were all slaves in Southern Louisiana, my father descended from one of John and Patience's three sons and his European American wife. I share segments with some of John and Patience's European American descendants that consist of what 23andme shows as being predominantly Southeastern African with a little Filipino/Austronesian. A French man with a paternal grandmother born in the Southeastern African island Madagascar matches me in the location that is Filipino/Austronesian. 23andme shows him as having Southeastern African and Filipino/Austronesian ancestry. His paternal grandmother was part Malagasy.
My highly mixed, diverse ancestry is reflected in my DNA relative matches at AncestryDNA, 23andme, FamilyTreeDNA, MyHeritage, and GEDmatch.
My AncestryDNA non-Sub Saharan African regions include:
7% Ashkenazi Jews in Central & Southeastern Europe
7% Ashkenazi Jews in Eastern Europe & Russia
6% West Midlands
8% Madeira
3% Portugal
3% North East England
2% Spain
2% Southeastern England & Northwestern Europe
2% Puerto Rico
2% Southern Wales
1% North Africa
1% Crete
My mother's AncestryDNA non-Sub Saharan African regions include:
16% Southeastern England & Northwestern Europe
14% Madeira
12% Ashkenazi Jews in Central & Southeastern Europe
12% Ashkenazi Jews in Eastern Europe & Russia
11% Portugal
10% West Midlands
4% Puerto Rico
3% Azores
3% North Africa
2% France
1% Sephardic Jews in Northern Africa
1% Eastern European Roma
Even though AncestryDNA has my maternal ancestry as 3% North East England, 2% Spain, 2% Southern Wales, 1% Leinster, Ireland , 1% Crete, 1% North Africa, my mother's AncestryDNA Estimate has none of those regions.
The only Non-Sub Saharan African that AncestryDNA has for my paternal ancestry is 3% Acadia. It has all my paternal European ancestry as Acadian even though it's not. I have paternal DNA relatives matches through ancestry that is not Acadian nor any type of French that include British/Irish, Swiss, and Danish. I share some with my father's much younger maternal half sister. My paternal grandmother's maternal grandfather's father was a European American son of Benjamin Cross Sr. who was an Anglo-American plantation/slave owner born in Gates County, North Carolina and Anastasia Bourgeois who was a 3/4 Acadian woman born in Plattenville, Assumption Parish in the Acadiana region located in Southern Louisiana. One of my paternal grandmother's maternal grandmother's parents descended from New Bern, Craven County, North Carolina couple John Ripley Kinsey (Kuntzli) who was a Swiss immigrant and Mary Ester Isler who was a Colonial European American of Palatine German and English ancestry.
I didn't get any paternal Indigenous American even though I have Indigenous American segments on paternal Chromosomes 5, 6, and 9 which the previous AncestryDNA Ethnicity Estimate had recognized. My paternal Chromosome 9 Indigenous segment is the longest of all Indigenous American segments that I have that include maternal chromosomes, paternal chromosomes, and X chromosome. I match only African Americans on that segment. Some are Louisianians, and some are not. Ancestry previously categorized my paternal Indigenous American as Indigenous Ecuadorean. The paternal Indigenous segments also show in my 23andme Ancestry Composition. 23andme shows that one of my younger paternal half brothers match me on my paternal Chromosome 6 Indigenous American segment, and that is the only Indigenous American segment that he is shown to have. My father's much younger maternal half sister matches me on that segment too, and so I know that the segment came from my paternal grandmother. I know that my paternal grandmother had some Indigenous American ancestry. My mother did tell me that my paternal grandmother had some French and Native American ancestry.
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