Native New Yorker Schelly Talalay Dardashti has lived in Teheran, Tel Aviv, Miami, Los Angeles, Las Vegas and now New Mexico. A journalist and genealogist, she is the US Genealogy Advisor for MyHeritage, and has traced her Ashkenazi, Sephardi and Mizrahi families across Iran, Spain, Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine. An early proponent of DNA for genealogy, she co-admins several DNA projects at FamilyTreeDNA. The former genealogy columnist for the Jerusalem Post ("It's All Relative," 1999-2005), she created the award-winning "Tracing the Tribe – The Jewish Genealogy Blog" (2006; now on hiatus), and "Tracing the Tribe – Jewish Genealogy on Facebook" (36,000+ members in 101 countries). Her articles have appeared on JTA, Reform Judaism, Hadassah, NGS Quarterly, Avotaynu and numerous Jewish and general genealogy publications, newspapers, and more. Affiliations: Social media coordinator, board member, Society for Crypto-Judaic Studies; president, JGS of New Mexico (sponsors annual Jewish Genetics and Jewish DNA/Genealogy conferences); founding member, Centro Sefarad NM (New Mexico).
