Family Networks are not often mentioned in the the current social network analysis literature, but I’m finding that my own family’s network has had an interesting “intervention” from the MyFamily.com website. For several years now, a second cousin (in Las Vegas) and a third cousin (in Denmark), and a pair of cousins in Wisconsin, have kept up a family web site. Discussions are lively, often going into strange tangents, and there are new photos almost daily of current events and resurrected and scanned old family photos. I know most of my cousins (my mother was the youngest of 10 children, so there are a lot of us in my generation, and the next two generations continue to grow) much better now that I ever would have through the brief chats at the annual family reunions and funerals. I know what people really like, how they use language, their musical preferences, and I’ve discovered a number of poets in the family.

Even more interesting is the way that this site has pulled me closer to two of my own brothers, both of whom are in the military. One, a Naval submarine Commander and the other an Army Master Sergeant. They have also been drawn to the sociability of the family web site, and we often connect there as well. And this network is a great source of support for the Army brother, who’s already seen service in Afghanistan and who leaves tomorrow for the Gulf. He will receive (as he did when in Afghanistan) cards and letters from cousins and second and third cousins he’s not met, and will know that he is in the waking thoughts of dozens of family members beyond those of the immediate family.

I don’t know if there is a way to measure the impact of the web on my family, but I do think that a social network analysis of the number and strength of ties before and after MyFamily.Com would be interesting indeed.