Arts & Sciences

If Congress and President Obama don’t reach a compromise before the end of the year to avoid the “fiscal cliff,” it will have major consequences on Washington University in St. Louis as well as other universities and colleges across the country, say WUSTL administrators​​.

You Bin Lim celebrates after participating in Washington University’s December Degree Candidate Recognition Ceremony in Graham Chapel Saturday, Dec. 1. Lim, a psychology major with a minor in French, is a candidate for a bachelor of arts degree in the College of Arts & Sciences. She was among some 800  students who filed as December degree candidates.

The word from Antarctica is that the polar vortex is setting up early this year and the balloon-borne Super-TIGER cosmic-ray experiment may be launched into the vortex any day now. Once the launch starts, web cams and a tracking map will go live at NASA’a Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility site Blogs and Twitter feeds are already providing a lively running commentary on the buildup to launch.

Washington University’s Department of Music in Arts & Sciences will present its annual sing-along of George Frideric Handel’s oratorio Messiah at 3 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 9, in Graham Chapel. Nicole Aldrich, director of choral activities, directs the program.

Tili Boon Cuillé, associate professor of French and co-convener of the 18th Century Interdisciplinary Salon, discusses the musical tableaux, the relationship between science and the humanities, and structuring the art of conversation.

Seven WUSTL faculty members have been named fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the world’s largest general scientific society.

Famed public intellectual Kwame Anthony Appiah, author of The Honor Code: How Moral Revolutions Happen, will present the keynote address Thursday, Nov. 29 for “Celebrating Our Books, Recognizing Our Authors,” Washington University’s 11th annual faculty book colloquium.

Ah, December. Days grow shorter, checkout lines longer, and final exams inexorably closer. But on Dec. 2, audiences are invited to pause for an afternoon of “Joy and Wonder.” Presented by the Washington University Concert Choir and the Washington University Chamber Choir, the concert will feature a range of music relating to the holiday season.

Mary Lou’s Mass is like a prayer on stage: a spirited homily rooted in the southern church, an uplifting sermon on life’s trials and ecstasies. On Nov. 30-Dec. 2, students from the Performing Arts Department in Arts & Sciences will perform excerpts from this groundbreaking collaboration between choreographer Alvin Ailey and jazz pianist Mary Lou Williams as part of Rootedness, Mobility and Migration, the 2012 Washington University Dance Theatre concert.

They’ve shaken Shakespeare, humiliated Hollywood and affronted all the great books. Now the Reduced Shakespeare Company—those emperors of editing, those sultans of summary, those bad boys of abbreviation—is back and ready to tackle its most fearsome opponent yet: Santa Claus.