Author: Gerry Everding

If your resolution is to be healthier, happier and more fit in the new year, focus first on finding a real purpose in life. People with a higher sense of purpose tend to engage in healthier lifestyle choices and are more likely to feel better about their own health status, according to new research from Washington University in St. Louis.

Gayle Fritz, professor of archaeology, and Natalie Mueller, a 2017 doctoral graduate, both of the Department of Anthropology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, have received the Patty Jo Watson Award for the year’s best article or book chapter on Southeastern archaeology.

In her new book, “Moral Combat: How Sex Divided American Christians and Fractured American Politics” (Basic Books, 2017), Washington University’s R. Marie Griffith offers a compelling history of the religious debates over sex and sexuality that came to dominate American public life.

Rebecca Lester, associate professor of sociocultural anthropology in Arts & Sciences, has been awarded the 2017 Stirling Prize for the Best Publication in Psychological Anthropology.

First domesticated 10,000 years ago in the Fertile Crescent of the Middle East, wheat and barley took vastly different routes to China, with barley switching from a winter to both winter and summer crop during a thousand-year detour along the southern Tibetan Plateau, suggests new research from Washington University in St. Louis.

Garland E. Allen, professor emeritus of biology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, will receive the History of Science Society’s 2017 Sarton Medal for lifetime scholarly achievement Nov. 10 at the society’s annual meeting in Toronto.

A new oral history series on the contributions of pioneering plant genetics researchers includes online video interviews with two professors who have strong ties to Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis: Glenn Stone and Mary-Dell Chilton.

A young Neandertal left deaf and partially paralyzed by a crippling blow to the head about 40,000 years ago must have relied on the help of others to avoid prey and survive well into his 40s, suggests a new analysis published Oct. 20 in the online journal PLoS ONE.

Cindy Brantmeier, professor of applied linguistics and education in Arts & Sciences, gave the  plenary address for the United Nations/UNESCO international conference on literacy in Chile in October.

Lauren Cubellis, a PhD candidate in sociocultural anthropology in Arts & Sciences, received a 2017-18 long-term research scholarship and intensive summer language course grant from the the German Academic Exchange Service (Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst, or DAAD).