{{short description|American historian and science writer}} {{Infobox writer | embed = | honorific_prefix = | name = Lydia V. Pyne | honorific_suffix = | image = Lydia Pyne Bayanzag Mongolia.jpg | image_size = | image_upright = | alt = | caption = Pyne at the Flaming Cliffs in 2017. | native_name = | native_name_lang = | pseudonym = | birth_name = | birth_date = <!-- {{Birth date and age|YYYY|MM|DD}} --> | birth_place = | death_date = <!-- {{Death date and age|YYYY|MM|DD|YYYY|MM|DD}} --> | death_place = | resting_place = | occupation = Writer<br/>Historian<ref name="Brenner">{{cite web |last1=Brenner |first1=Wayne Alan |title=The Seven Skeletons of Lydia Pyne |url=https://www.austinchronicle.com/arts/2016-08-12/the-seven-skeletons-of-lydia-pyne/ |website=Austin Chronicle |accessdate=8 March 2020}}</ref> | language = English | nationality = | citizenship = United States | education = University of Texas<ref name="Brenner"/> | alma_mater = Arizona State University<ref name="ASUNow"/> | period = | genre = History<br>Non-fiction<!-- or: | genres = --> | subject = Science<!-- or: | subjects = --> | movement = | notableworks = <!-- or: | notablework = --> | spouse = <!-- or: | spouses = --> | partner = <!-- or: | partners = --> | children = | relatives = | awards = | signature = | signature_alt = | years_active = | module = | website = {{URL|http://www.pynecone.org/}} | portaldisp = <!-- "on", "yes", "true", etc.; or omit --> }} '''Lydia V. Pyne''' is an American historian and science writer. She is a current visiting fellow at the Institute for Historical Studies at the University of Texas at Austin.<ref name="Bookshop">{{cite book |title=Genuine Fakes: How Phony Things Teach Us about Real Stuff |url=https://bookshop.org/books/genuine-fakes-how-phony-things-teach-us-about-real-stuff/9781472961822 |website=Bookshop |accessdate=10 March 2020 |language=en |date=29 October 2019|isbn=978-1-4729-6182-2 }}</ref> Pyne and her work have been featured in ''National Geographic'',<ref name="Worrall">{{cite web |last1=Worrall |first1=Simon |title=Meet 7 Celebrity Fossils and Find Out What Made Them Famous |url=https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2016/09/seven-skeletons-famous-human-fossils-lydia-pyne/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201008174122/https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2016/09/seven-skeletons-famous-human-fossils-lydia-pyne/ |url-status=dead |archive-date=October 8, 2020 |website=National Geographic News |accessdate=8 March 2020 |language=en |date=25 September 2016}}</ref> ''Inside Higher Education'',<ref name="McLemee">{{cite news |last1=McLemee |first1=Scott |title=Lydia Pyne, 'Genuine Fakes: How Phony Things Teach Us About Real Stuff' {{!}} Inside Higher Ed |url=https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2019/09/13/lydia-pyne-genuine-fakes-how-phony-things-teach-us-about-real-stuff |accessdate=8 March 2020 |work=Inside Higher Education |language=en}}</ref> the ''Wall Street Journal'',<ref name="Poole">{{cite news |last1=Poole |first1=Steven |title='Genuine Fakes' Review: Not Quite the Real Thing |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/genuine-fakes-review-not-quite-the-real-thing-11576022132 |accessdate=8 March 2020 |work=Wall Street Journal |date=10 December 2019}}</ref> and on ABC,<ref name="ABC1">{{cite web |title=Bookshelf - A History |url=https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/archived/booksandarts/bookshelf/7776008 |website=Radio National |accessdate=8 March 2020 |language=en-AU |date=6 September 2016}}</ref> ''Science Friday'',<ref name="SciFri">{{cite web |title=In A World Of Lab-Grown Diamonds, What Is Real And Fake? |url=https://www.sciencefriday.com/segments/real-and-fake/ |website=Science Friday |accessdate=8 March 2020}}</ref> WHYY,<ref name="WHYY">{{cite web |title=Fake vs. Real — And When It Matters |url=https://whyy.org/episodes/fake-vs-real-and-when-it-matters/ |website=WHYY |accessdate=8 March 2020}}</ref> KERA,<ref>{{cite news |title=Famous Fossils |url=https://think.kera.org/2016/08/17/fossils-and-mankind/ |accessdate=8 March 2020 |work=Think |date=17 August 2016}}</ref> Wisconsin Public Radio,<ref name="Peterson">{{cite web |last1=Peterson |first1=Tim |title=Fake Or Not? And Does It Matter? |url=https://www.wpr.org/fake-or-not-and-does-it-matter |website=Wisconsin Public Radio |accessdate=8 March 2020 |language=en |date=5 December 2019}}</ref> and ''Talk Nerdy''.<ref name="TN283">{{cite web |title=Talk Nerdy Episode 283 - Lydia Pyne |url=https://www.carasantamaria.com/podcast/lydia-pyne-2 |website=Talk Nerdy |date=11 November 2019 |accessdate=8 March 2020}}</ref>
==Early life and education==
Pyne credits her father, Stephen J. Pyne and her mother, Sonja,<ref>{{cite web |title=Stephen J. Pyne |url=http://www.stephenpyne.com/bio.htm |website=Stephen Pyne's website |accessdate=10 March 2020}}</ref> with encouraging her to pursue the sciences by being "curious about a lot of things". When she pursued higher education, Pyne was an English major.<ref name="Brenner"/> She ended up switching to anthropology and history, earning a double major in the subjects, both from Arizona State University.<ref name="Brenner"/><ref name="PyneconeCV">{{cite web |title=CV |url=http://www.pynecone.org/curriculumvita |website=Lydia Pyne |accessdate=10 March 2020}}</ref> She earned her master's from the University of Texas, Austin in anthropology and biology at Arizona State.<ref name="Brenner"/><ref name="PyneconeCV"/> For her PhD, she started as an archaeology student and in the end, earned a degree in history and philosophy of science from Arizona State University.<ref name="Brenner"/><ref name="ASUNow">{{cite web |title=Father-daughter co-authors explore new approach to human origins |url=https://asunow.asu.edu/content/father-daughter-co-authors-explore-new-approach-human-origins |website=ASU Now: Access, Excellence, Impact |accessdate=10 March 2020 |language=en |date=26 October 2012}}</ref>
==Career==
Pyne's first book was ''The Last Lost World: Ice Ages, Human Origins, and the Invention of the Pleistocene'' was co-authored with her father, Stephen J. Pyne in 2012.<ref name="Brenner"/> That year, she served as a fellow at Pennoni Honors College at Drexel University.<ref name="TN283" />
Pyne's second book is ''Bookshelf'', a history of the bookshelf, which was published in 2016 by Bloomsbury as part of their "Object Lessons" series.<ref name="Brenner"/> That same year, Viking Press published Pyne's ''Seven Skeletons: The Evolution of the World's Most Famous Human Fossils''. ''Seven Skeletons'' presents the history of "celebrity fossils" including Lucy and La Chapelle-aux-Saints 1.<ref name="Worrall"/>
In 2019, Pyne's book ''Genuine Fakes: How Phony Things Teach Us About Real Stuff'' was published by Bloomsbury. The book examines the difference between artificial and "real" things, such as real diamonds versus lab grown diamonds.<ref name="SciFri"/>
Currently, Pyne is a visiting researcher at the Institute for Historical Studies at the University of Texas at Austin.<ref name="Bookshop" /> Pyne is also a freelance writer. Her science and history writing has been published in ''Hyperallergic'',<ref name="Hyperallergic">{{cite web |title=Belated Acclaim for Dorothy Hood's Surreal Abstractions |url=https://hyperallergic.com/524646/dorothy-hood-illuminated-earth-mcclain-gallery/ |website=Hyperallergic |accessdate=8 March 2020 |date=15 November 2019}}</ref> the ''Pacific Standard''<ref name="PS1">{{cite news |last1=Pyne |first1=Lydia |title='Dinosaur Diplomacy': Andrew Carnegie Thought Fossils Could Save Europe From World War I |url=https://psmag.com/ideas/andrew-carnegies-quixotic-quest-to-use-dinosaurs-for-diplomacy |accessdate=8 March 2020 |work=Pacific Standard |language=en}}</ref> and ''Archaeology''.<ref name="Archaeology1">{{cite web |last1=Pyne |first1=Lydia |title=Denisovans at Altitude - Archaeology Magazine |url=https://archaeology.org/issues/january-february-2020/collection/china-tibetan-plateau-denisovans/top-10-discoveries-of-2019/ |website=Archaeology |access-date=8 March 2020}}</ref>
Pyne's two most recent books were published in 2021 and 2022. ''Postcards: The Rise and Fall of the World's First Social Network'' was the first of these, published by Reaktion Books.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Pyne |first=Lydia V. |title=Postcards: The Rise and Fall of the World's First Social Network |publisher=Reaktion |year=2021 |isbn=978-1789144840}}</ref> In it, Pyne investigates postcards in order "to understand them as artifacts that are at the intersection of history, science, technology, art, and culture."<ref>{{Cite web |date=18 October 2021 |title=Reaktion Books |url=http://www.reaktionbooks.co.uk/display.asp?ISB=9781789144840 |access-date=21 September 2022}}</ref> ''Endlings,'' published in August 2022, is part of the [https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/series/forerunners-ideas-first Forerunners: Ideas First] series from University of Minnesota Press.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Pyne |first=Lydia |title=Endlings: Fables for the Anthropocene |publisher=University of Minnesota Press |year=2022 |isbn=978-1-5179-1483-7}}</ref> In this book, Pyne talks about how the stories we tell about endlings, or the last known individual of a species, draw from various narrative traditions and what those stories can tell us about grief and loss.
==Works== *with Stephen J. Pyne: {{cite book|title=The Last Lost World: Ice Ages, Human Origins, and the Invention of the Pleistocene|publisher=Viking|year=2012}}<ref>{{cite web|title=Review of ''The Last Lost World: Ice Ages, Human Origins, and the Invention of the Pleistocene'' by Lydia V. Pyne and Stephen J. Pyne|date=26 March 2012|website=Publishers Weekly|url=https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-670-02363-9}}</ref> {{cite book|title=pbk edition|year=2013|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GTeNDQAAQBAJ|isbn=978-0-14-312342-2|last1=Pyne|first1=Lydia|last2=Pyne|first2=Stephen J.|publisher=Penguin }} *{{cite book|title=Bookshelf|publisher=Bloomsbury|series=Object Lessons (a book series about the hidden lives of ordinary things)|year=2016}}<ref>{{cite web|title=The Meaning of a Bookshelf: An Interview with Lydia Pyne|date=29 January 2016|website=BookPeople|url=https://bookpeopleblog.com/2016/01/29/the-meaning-of-a-bookshelf-an-interview-with-lydia-pyne/}}</ref> {{cite book|title=pbk edition|year=2016|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HIU-CwAAQBAJ|isbn=978-1-5013-0732-4|last1=Pyne|first1=Lydia|publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing USA }} *{{cite book|title=Seven Skeletons: The Evolution of the World's Most Famous Human Fossils|publisher=Viking|year=2016|isbn=978-0-525-42985-2 |url=https://archive.org/details/sevenskeletonsev0000pyne|url-access=registration}}<ref>{{cite web|title=Review of ''Seven Skeletons: The Evolution of the World's Most Famous Human Fossils'' by Lydia Pyne|year=2016|website=Kirkus Reviews|url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/lydia-pyne/seven-skeletons/}}</ref> *{{cite book|title=Genuine Fakes: How Phony Things Teach Us About Real Stuff|date=8 August 2019|publisher=Bloomsbury|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tmCWDwAAQBAJ|isbn=978-1-4729-6182-2}}<ref>{{cite journal|title=Review of ''Genuine Fakes: How Phony Things Teach Us About Real Stuff'' by Lydia Pyne|date=14 June 2019|journal=Publishers Weekly|url=https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-4729-6182-2}}</ref> *{{cite book|title=Postcards: The Rise and Fall of the World's First Social Network|date=13 October 2021|publisher=Reaktion Books|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Bvw8EAAAQBAJ|isbn=978-1789144857}} *{{cite book|title=Endlings: Fables for the Anthropocene|date=16 August 2022|publisher=University of Minnesota Press|url=https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/endlings|isbn=978-1-5179-1483-7}}
==Personal life== Pyne lives in Austin, Texas.<ref name="Worrall"/> She's an active member of the American Alpine Club.<ref>{{cite web |title=AAC Publications - Alam Kuh (4,805m) and Damavand (5,610m), AAC Exchange |url=http://publications.americanalpineclub.org/articles/12201220100/Asia-Middle-East-Iran-Alam-Kuh-4805m-and-Damavand-5610m-AAC-Exchange |website=American Alpine Club |accessdate=10 March 2020}}</ref>
==References== <references/>
==External links== *{{official|http://www.pynecone.org/}} *{{C-SPAN|107547}} *[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZXPAi9Eqqk Lydia Pyne's Talks at Google presentation] about ''Genuine Fakes: How Phony Things Teach Us About Real Stuff''
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Pyne, Lydia V.}} Category:1979 births Category:Living people Category:21st-century American historians Category:21st-century American women writers Category:Arizona State University alumni Category:University of Texas at Austin alumni Category:American historians of science Category:American women science writers Category:American mountain climbers