"We are the sum of all the people who lived before us"

So says Meryl Streep in Faces of America - a new PBS show tracing the family history of 12 prominent Americans - that started this week. If you missed the first episode, you can watch the whole thing right here. Yo-Yo Ma, Elizabeth Alexander, Malcolm Gladwell, Eva Longoria and others all hear about and tell about their family histories in a beautiful and faultless series put together by Henry Gates Jr. (yes, that Henry Gates Jr.)

You can catch the next episode on TV this coming Wednesday - set those DVRs!

If there is a unifying theme to Faces in America it may be that "ancestors matters". As Stephen Colbert says on hearing for the first time about some of his ancestors, "They come all around me...I feel like I am surrounded by other people now".

This sense of enhanced identity and feeling of belonging to something deeper and wider than our immediate family is a common dividend from learning about one's family history. Another dividend, which often comes after hearing about our ancestors' labors, failures, and eventual survival - is strength; the strength to bear our own daily burdens knowing what our forebears suffered with and endured.

In our video biography work, we often hear wonderful stories of immigrant struggle and success. And we often hear the more difficult accounts of personal struggle, of difficult decisions, of compromises and regrets. In all cases we see people achieve a new level of understanding and a greater appreciation for our common humanity. Faces in America is lovely to watch - all the more so because it features some of America's most thoughtful, charismatic and successful individuals. It remains to be seen if the show can convert more ordinary Americans to do their own research and learn about their own families - and experience that same sense of surprise, delight and wonder.

It would be a shame if people take from the show the message that famous people have the most interesting back stories. Don't they have more of everything else? Well, our own experience recording life stories to video is that every family tree has surprise and intrigue (check this video memoir example from a project we completed a little time back called "Alyce D's Armenian Roots - Video Memoir").

But you need to make the start - not everyone has Henry Gates Jr. to do the work for them. (You do need to be famous to have that happen!)

But let another celebrity - one who was not featured on the show (but perhaps should have been) - sum it up best:

When a parent dies, it's the end. I always wanted to chronicle the family history with my mother. She was always interested in that ...but my mother was a little antsy about it. I know she would've gotten into it. It would have been okay with my father, too. But I wasn't forceful, and I didn't make it happen. That's one regret I have. I didn't get as much of the family history as I could have for the kids. Robert De Niro: Esquire: What I've Learned

As fun to watch as Faces in America unquestionably is, our verdict is this: personal and family history is not just a spectator sport!