Rebecca Wragg Sykes Explained

Rebecca Wragg Sykes is a British paleolithic archaeologist, broadcaster, popular science writer and author who lives in Wales. She is interested in the Middle Palaeolithic, specifically in the lives of Neanderthals; and she is one of the founders of TrowelBlazers, a website set up to celebrate the lives of women in archaeology, palaeontology and geology. She is a patron of Humanists UK.[1]

Career

Wragg Sykes studied as an undergraduate at the University of Bristol, before gaining her BA in Archaeology in 2003, and MA in the Archaeology of Human Origins from the University of Southampton in 2004. Her doctoral thesis from the University of Sheffield, which examined evidence for late Neanderthals in Britain, was awarded in 2010.

Following her Ph.D, Wragg Sykes was awarded a Marie Curie postdoctoral fellowship at Université de Bordeaux, working in the PACEA laboratory on Neanderthal and prehistoric sites in the Massif Central mountains. She is currently an Honorary Fellow in the School of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology at the University of Liverpool, and chercheur bénévole (Honorary Fellow) at the Université de Bordeaux.[2] [3]

Science communication

Wragg Sykes has written for The Guardian,[4] Scientific American[5] and Aeon,[6] and appeared on history and science programmes for BBC Radio 3[7] and Radio 4.[8]

In 2020, Wragg Sykes published [9] which won the 2021 Current Archaeology Book of the Year Award,[10] [11] the 2021 Hessel-Tiltman History Prize, the 2022 Public Anthropology Award from the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland and the 2022 President's Award from The Prehistoric Society. Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love Death and Art was also a finalist in the 2022 Premio Galileo Awards and has been favourably reviewed by Current Archaeology,[12] London Review of Books,[13] Nature,[14] The Guardian[15] and The New York Times;[16] reviews have been published in other media outlets as well.[17] [18] [19]

Yuval Noah Harari, author of the bestseller , thought Wragg Sykes had done "a remarkable job synthesizing thousands of academic studies into a single accessible narrative".[16] Alice Roberts, author and presenter of the television series The Incredible Human Journey, said it was "a wonderful portrait of these enigmatic, long-lost relatives".[9] Writing in The Sunday Times about the best philosophy and ideas books of the year 2020, James McConnachie praised how it reveals the latest theories about Neanderthal life, from the tools they used to the funerals they performed.[20]

Wragg Sykes has also written for DK and was one of the authors for the book Big History,[21] although she and the other authors were "aligned with" the OER Project rather than members of the organization.[22]

TrowelBlazers

In 2013, Wragg Sykes started, together with other female scientists, the TrowelBlazers project, a public-led experiment in participatory archaeology, originating from the lack of visibility of women in science. TrowelBlazers has highlighted women from the fields of archaeology, geology and palaeontology.[23]

References

  1. Web site: Michael Cashman, Rebecca Wragg Sykes, and Roger Hutton join Humanists UK as new patrons . 2024-03-27 . Humanists UK . en-GB.
  2. Web site: 21 August 2020. Conversations with: Dr Rebecca Wragg Sykes. 28 February 2021. Conversations in Human Evolution. en. 8 March 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210308164702/https://conversationsinhumanevolution.com/2020/08/21/conversations-with-dr-rebecca-wragg-sykes/. live.
  3. Web site: 27 October 2020. Michael Shermer with Rebecca Wragg Sykes — Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death and Art. 28 February 2021. Skeptic. en. 16 January 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210116184525/https://www.skeptic.com/michael-shermer-show/rebecca-wragg-sykes-kindred-neanderthal-life-love-death-art/. live.
  4. Web site: Becky Wragg Sykes. The Guardian. 28 March 2021. 30 January 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210130153755/https://www.theguardian.com/profile/becky-wragg-sykes. live.
  5. Web site: Stories by Rebecca Wragg Sykes. Scientific American. 28 March 2021.
  6. Web site: Rebecca Wragg Sykes. Aeon. 28 March 2021. 20 February 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210220175930/https://aeon.co/users/rebecca-wragg-sykes. live.
  7. News: Family ties and reshaping history. BBC. 17 September 2020. 28 March 2021. 2 January 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210102233309/https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000mjt2. live.
  8. News: You're dead to me. BBC. 21 November 2020. 28 March 2021. 21 November 2020. https://web.archive.org/web/20201121125951/https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0853185. live.
  9. Book: Wragg Sykes, Rebecca. Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death and Art. 2020. London. Bloomsbury Sigma. 978-1472937490.
  10. Web site: Current Archaeology Awards. 2021-03-13. Current Archaeology.
  11. Web site: Current Archaeology Awards 2021 . Current Archaeology . Julian Richards . March 5, 2021 . December 15, 2021.
  12. Web site: 2020-09-21. Review – Kindred: Neanderthal life, love, death, and art. 2021-03-13. Current Archaeology. en-US. 26 February 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210226095732/https://archaeology.co.uk/articles/reviews/books/review-kindred-neanderthal-life-love-death-and-art.htm. live.
  13. News: Lanchester. John. 2020-12-17. Twenty Types of Human. en. 42. London Review of Books. 24. 2021-03-05. 0260-9592. 20 March 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210320183447/https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v42/n24/john-lanchester/twenty-types-of-human. live.
  14. Glausiusz. Josie. 18 August 2020. Horse eyeballs and bone hammers: surprising lives of the Neanderthals. Nature. en. 584. 7821. 342–343. 10.1038/d41586-020-02420-3. 221146679.
  15. Web site: 20 December 2020. Kindred by Rebecca Wragg Sykes review – a new understanding of humanity. 28 February 2021. The Guardian. en. 28 February 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210228130104/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/dec/20/kindred-by-rebecca-wragg-sykes-review-a-new-understanding-of-humanity. live.
  16. News: Harari . Yuval Noah . Yuval Noah Harari . 7 November 2020 . At Home With Our Ancient Cousins, the Neanderthals . en-US . The New York Times . live . 28 February 2021 . https://web.archive.org/web/20210303082318/https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/07/books/review/kindred-neanderthals-rebecca-wragg-sykes.html . 3 March 2021 . 0362-4331.
  17. Web site: 13 November 2020. Book Review: A Fresh Look at Our Neanderthal Relatives. 28 February 2021. npj Science of Learning Community. en. 24 February 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210224233622/https://npjscilearncommunity.nature.com/posts/book-review-a-fresh-look-at-our-neanderthal-relatives. live.
  18. Web site: 'Kindred' Dismantles Simplistic Views Of Neanderthals. 28 February 2021. NPR.org. en. 4 March 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210304014947/https://www.npr.org/2020/10/27/927772107/kindred-dismantles-simplistic-views-of-neanderthals. live.
  19. Web site: Emma. Pomeroy. 27 October 2020. A nuanced portrait of Neanderthals encourages empathy and understanding. 28 February 2021. Books, Et Al.. en-US. 28 February 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210228230342/https://blogs.sciencemag.org/books/2020/10/27/kindred/. live.
  20. News: Best philosophy and ideas books of the year 2020. 29 November 2020. The Sunday Times. James. McConnachie. 28 March 2021. 22 March 2021. https://web.archive.org/web/20210322103346/https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/best-philosophy-and-ideas-books-of-the-year-2020-m03xqdslj. live.
  21. Book: Bohan . Elise . Big History . Dinwiddie . Robert . Challoner . Jack . Stuart . Colin . Harvey . Derek . Wragg-Sykes . Rebecca . Chrisp . Peter . Hubbard . Ben . Parker . Phillip . Writers . February 2016 . . . 978-1-4654-5443-0 . 1st American . . 940282526.
  22. Web site: 2022 . Big History by DK: 9780744048445 . 2023-03-17 . . en-US.
  23. Hassett. B.. Birch. S.P.. Herridge . V. . Sykes. R.W.. 2018. TrowelBlazers: accidentally crowdsourcing an archive of women in archaeology. Shared Knowledge, Shared Power. SpringerBriefs in Archaeology . 129–141. 10.1007/978-3-319-68652-3_9 . 978-3-319-68651-6 .

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