Kathlyn M. (Kara) Cooney is an
Egyptologist
Egyptology (from ''Egypt'' and Greek , '' -logia''; ar, علم المصريات) is the study of ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, architecture and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end of its native religiou ...
,
archaeologist, professor of Egyptian Art and Architecture at
UCLA
The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California ...
and chair of the Department of Near Eastern Language and Cultures at
UCLA
The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California ...
. As well as for her scholarly work, she is known for hosting television shows on ancient Egypt on the
Discovery Channel as well as for writing a popular-press book on the subject. She specialises in craft production, coffin studies, and economies in the ancient world.
Education and career
Raised in
Houston
Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 i ...
, she obtained her
Bachelor of Arts
Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four year ...
in
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
** Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ge ...
and
Humanities
Humanities are academic disciplines that study aspects of human society and culture. In the Renaissance, the term contrasted with divinity and referred to what is now called classics, the main area of secular study in universities at the t ...
from the
University of Texas
The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...
in
Austin in 1994. She was awarded a
PhD in 2002 by
Johns Hopkins University
Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hemisphere. It consi ...
for ''Near Eastern Studies''. She was part of an archaeological team excavating at the artisans' village of
Deir el Medina
Deir el-Medina ( arz, دير المدينة), or Dayr al-Madīnah, is an ancient Egyptian workmen's village which was home to the artisans who worked on the tombs in the Valley of the Kings during the 18th to 20th Dynasties of the New Kingdom of ...
in Egypt, as well as
Dahshur
DahshurAlso transliterated ''Dahshour'' (in English often called ''Dashur'' ar, دهشور ' , ''Dahchur'') is a royal necropolis located in the desert on the west bank of the Nile approximately south of Cairo. It is known chiefly for several p ...
and various tombs at
Thebes. In 2002 she was
Kress Fellow at the
National Gallery of Art and worked on the preparation of the
Cairo Museum
The Museum of Egyptian Antiquities, known commonly as the Egyptian Museum or the Cairo Museum, in Cairo, Egypt, is home to an extensive collection of ancient Egyptian antiquities. It has 120,000 items, with a representative amount on display ...
exhibition ''Quest for Immortality: Treasures of Ancient Egypt''. After a temporary one-year position at UCLA, she took a three-year postdoctoral teaching position at
Stanford University,
during which, In 2005, she acted as fellow curator for ''
Tutankhamun
Tutankhamun (, egy, twt-ꜥnḫ-jmn), Egyptological pronunciation Tutankhamen () (), sometimes referred to as King Tut, was an Egyptian pharaoh who was the last of his royal family to rule during the end of the Eighteenth Dynasty (ruled ...
and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs'' at the
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) is an art museum located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles. LACMA is on Museum Row, adjacent to the La Brea Tar Pits (George C. Page Museum).
LACMA was founded in 19 ...
. She also worked for two years at the
Getty Center before landing a tenure-track position at UCLA in 2009.
Cooney's current research in coffin reuse, primarily focusing on the 20th Dynasty, is ongoing. Her research investigates the socioeconomic and political turmoil that have plagued the period, ultimately affecting funerary and burial practices in ancient Egypt.
She currently resides in Los Angeles.
Television
She hosted two
Discovery Channel documentary series: ''Out of Egypt'',
first aired in August 2009, and ''Egypt's Lost Queen'', which also featured
Zahi Hawass
Zahi Abass Hawass ( ar, زاهي حواس; born May 28, 1947) is an Egyptian archaeologist, Egyptologist, and former Minister of State for Antiquities Affairs, serving twice. He has also worked at archaeological sites in the Nile Delta, the Wes ...
.
Books
*
*
*
*
Personal
Cooney's paternal grandparents were from
County Cork
County Cork ( ga, Contae Chorcaí) is the largest and the southernmost county of Ireland, named after the city of Cork, the state's second-largest city. It is in the province of Munster and the Southern Region. Its largest market towns a ...
in Ireland. She is named after her Irish-Protestant grandmother Kathlyn Mary, who was disowned by her family for marrying Cooney’s Irish-Catholic grandfather James.
Her mother is Italian, her grandmother was from the
Abruzzi region, and her grandfather from
Naples
Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...
.
She uses the name Kathlyn for her scholarly work, and her nickname Kara for professional but non-academic work.
References
External links
Interview with Kara Cooney
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cooney, Kara
Living people
American Egyptologists
Year of birth missing (living people)
American expatriates in Egypt
Johns Hopkins University alumni
University of California, Los Angeles faculty
American women archaeologists
21st-century American women