Finding Your Roots

Their European immigrant ancestors blazed unconventional trails in America, from capturing British ships for the American Revolution to crossing racial barriers in slave-era Louisiana.

This program features two African-American politicians from different generations and opposite backgrounds.

What’s in a name? Well, a lot, at least when it comes to piecing together family history.

Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick are both famous actors and both descend from prominent American families that have been in this country since its inception. They both have ancestors who were early opponents of slavery.

Pastor Rick Warren, Rabbi Angela Buchdahl and Sheik Yasir Qadhi — clerics of three different faiths — all have complex family histories that profoundly shaped their religious beliefs.

Many Americans descend from a variety of European ethnicities, with ancestral roots across every country in Europe.

Samuel L. Jackson, Condoleezza Rice and Brown University president, Ruth Simmons, have each climbed to the pinnacle of their profession, yet each started life as a second-class citizen in the Jim Crow south.

The three guests in this episode are all children of first- or second-generation immigrants and share the peculiar burdens of that heritage.

Most African Americans struggle to trace their ancestors beyond Emancipation; slavery erased names and family ties with brutal efficiency. What about the descendants of the few free black people who evaded bondage during that terrible time?

Michelle Rodriguez, Adrian Grenier and Linda Chavez all share Spanish colonial roots, yet each views their own identity very differently.