Short bio:
Writes about culture, conservation, and disaster—the brine where humans and nature collide and mix. He has lived and worked his way from the American South, through the Andes, Amazon, Asia’s Ring of Fire, East Africa’s Cradle of Humanity, around the world and back again to rural America. Shane writes from near Charlottesville, Virginia.

250-word bio: J. Shane Townsend is a writer, traveler, former diplomat, and community servant from the storied state of Mississippi. At his grandmother’s Pascagoula boarding house and at the family’s Lincoln County farm, young Shane sat rapt at the feet of watermen, moonshiners, and women poets with calloused hands, drunk in stories earned and spun. There began a wanderlust, a compulsion to serve, and fascinations with nature, people and their stories. Shane finished academic studies in anthropology, creative writing, and subjects more easily monetized, and he followed one opportunity after another in pursuit of service and story. Shane responded to the September 11, 2001 attack on the Pentagon, worked in tent cities after Hurricane Katrina, and lived—as a Peace Corps volunteer—in the Andes and Amazon of Bolivia. He studied Filipino martial arts and muay thai in South Asia. And, from his base in Nairobi, worked with people—from villages to urban centers—across east Africa. He was facilitator for a domestic abuse intervention group. And he was a member of mountain search and rescue team. In every endeavor, the connecting threads in the patchwork quilt were people and nature, service and story.

Shane’s writing explores culture, conservation, and disaster—the brine where humans and nature collide and mix. His work has been featured in MeatEater, Garden & Gun, Modern Huntsman, Field & Stream, Hatch, Native Peoples, USA TODAY Hunt & Fish, Americas, Sporting Classics, Matador
Network, and other outlets. His work has been recognized with awards from the Outdoor Writers Association of America, Professional Outdoor Media Association, and other organizations.