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Freelancer based in St. Louis Missouri. Graduate of NYU Arthur L. Carter School of Journalism.
Professor Elizabeth Childs (fourth from right) and her art history students at the National Gallery in London, where they viewed the Van Gogh exhibition. Imagine the color blue. Now, try describing it without naming it. Would you evoke the vastness of the sky or the tranquility of flowing water?
Since 2005, Nicola Aravecchia, associate professor of classics, art history, and archaeology, has been working in Egypt's Western Desert, uncovering the hidden history of Christianity in the Dakhla Oasis. In 2022, he became the archaeological field director at Amheida/Trimithis, a Graeco-Roman city in Dakhla where the team had previously discovered an early Christian church.
It's fine to shop at farmers markets and grocery stores for recipe ingredients. But what if you could gather some of them by foraging-and, at the same time, help rid your region of non-native plant species that are harming America's ecosystems? According to the National Wildlife Federation, about 42 percent of today's threatened or endangered species are at risk because of invasive species.
On September 20, 1903, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch published a full-page article about West Plains, Missouri, a small town 200 miles from St. Louis. The story featured a dramatic illustration of a Black man fleeing on foot.
"As the sun dipped low in the western sky, casting long shadows against the sleepy town of St. Petersburg, I found myself strolling lazily along the banks of the Mississippi River." "A broad expanse of the river was turned to blood; in the middle distance the red hue brightened into gold, through which a solitary log came floating."
Earlier this year, Missouri hosted the state's first Black Maternal Health Summit in Columbia. The summit's keynote speaker, Commonsense
This fall, Peter Kastor is taking students on a journey back to 1984. While other Arts & Sciences courses spotlight individual years for their major historical events, the Samuel K. Eddy Professor takes a different tack.
Eduardo C. Corral (Photo by Matt Valentine) Award-winning poet Eduardo C. Corral will soon join the Department of English as a member of the MFA faculty. His first poetry collection, "Slow Lightning," was selected by Carl Phillips, professor of English, for the 2011 Yale Series of Younger Poets prize, and his second manuscript, "Guillotine," was longlisted for the National Book Award.
What does a building mean to a community? Ask Michael Allen, lecturer in American culture studies, and he'll tell you a building is more than a physical structure. Preserving the built environment can act as a "storehouse" against the forces that sweep in and change communities, he said.
In the 50 years since hip-hop debuted on the music scene, it has moved from outsider art to a dominant force in popular culture, influencing everything from fashion to language to visual art. College students today don't know a world without it.
Assistant Attorney General Carlos Felipe Uriarte. (Photo: Office of Legislative Affair) Professor Peter Kastor was flipping through TV channels one night in 2023 when he landed on C-SPAN. Attorney General Merrick Garland was facing a grilling by members of the U.S. House of Representatives, but that wasn't all that caught Kastor's eye.
Go backstage at one of his concerts and there's a good chance you'll find Assistant Professor of English G'Ra Asim grading a stack of student papers before he takes the stage. As a writer, Asim is known for illuminating aspects of the Black experience that elude the mainstream, work that's probed our cultural fascination with awkwardness.
When he started his PhD in political science in the early 2000s, Andrew Reeves wasn't sure he would have likened a political campaign to a start-up business. But, since then, the field has changed. Now, he said, it seems like a natural comparison.
It was a simple idea that grew organically: A group of women who first met while attending Central High School in the early '50s made a plan to gather
Welcome to the post-pandemic, work-from-home revolution. Changing policies, technologies, and economic conditions over the past few years have brought about radical shifts in how, when, and where people work. The once-in-a-generation experience of COVID-19 shined a light on existing workplace trends and, in many cases, led to new ones.
Over the past year, Anne King and her five-year-old daughter have grown native plants in their Portland, Oregon, yard to attract wildlife like birds. Although she knows that gardening can be beneficial for childhood development and overall well-being , gardening with native species-plants that occur naturally in a place without human assistance-can go even further, introducing children to complex concepts like ecosystems, pollinators, and biodiversity.
(CAHOKIA, Illinois) - Arianna Norris-Landry, 60, moved to the small Illinois town of Cahokia six years ago, when her son went there to open a prepaid-wireless-phone store. During that time, she's seen the impact that population loss, infrastructure decay, and environmental degradation has had on the community.
After moving to New York City in the early 2000s to work as a principal dancer with the legendary Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and as a soloist at the Dance Theater of Harlem, Antonio Douthit-Boyd never thought he'd land back in his hometown of St. Louis.
Geoff Childs, professor of sociocultural anthropology, has been researching demographic trends in Nubri, a highland Buddhist community in Nepal's Himalayas. He's done fieldwork there since the '90s when he began studying demographic processes such as historical migrations and fertility transitions in the region.
Today, the voices of Templeton and his fellow meteorologists are more important than ever. Although the tools we use to forecast weather are increasingly accurate, the weather itself is becoming more extreme.
Luke Church jumped out of a plane for the first time 14 years ago on a Saturday afternoon. It was so thrilling, he went back the next day and jumped three more times. Since then, Church has completed more than 7,000 jumps of varying degrees of intensity, while helping fellow skydivers get their fix.
Ariana Benson, a second-year student in the English MFA program, will publish her first poetry collection "Black Pastoral" in September. She wrote much of the collection during COVID when the pandemic compelled her to leave London, where she'd been studying poetic practice as a Marshall Scholar.
Tyrin Truong's feet still ache. More than two months had passed since the WashU alumnus ran for mayor of Bogalusa, Louisiana, and his feet were still sore from 10 months of door-knocking up and down the nearly ten square-mile city. He'd known that's what it would take for a 23-year-old Democrat to oust a two-term Republican in a red state.
(EAST ST. LOUIS, Illinois) - "Food deserts" or "healthcare deserts" are communities that lack access to vital resources due to the scarcity of supermarkets, grocery stores, clinics or hospitals. Gateway Pet Guardians, a nonprofit organization in southern Illinois, is addressing the problem of resource deserts for pet owners and their animal friends.
Steve Hindle Steve Hindle, the Derek Hirst Professor of Early Modern British History, won the Joan Thirsk Memorial Prize for his book "The Social Topography of a Rural Community: Scenes of Labouring Life in Seventeenth-Century England." Sponsored by the British Agricultural History Society, the Thirsk Prize is awarded annually for the best book in British or Irish rural or agrarian history.
It's hard to keep up with Winston Moore, even when school is out. As his spring semester was finishing up (with two wins at the state track and field championship), preparation for fall football was about to begin.
1. "Love Poem in the Black Field" by Ariana Benson. Benson is a current MFA student in the English department. In 2022 she won the Furious Flower Poetry Prize, and her book "Black Pastoral" won the 2022 Cave Canem Poetry Prize.
Author is among 171 winners of award from John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Edward McPherson, an associate professor of English in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, has won a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship.
It all started with Pokémon Go. Iva Youkilis, teaching professor in Italian in the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, watched as her three young sons grew obsessed with the augmented reality game. As she drove them around to find and "capture" virtual pokémon on their phones, she began learning the names and attributes of different pokémon figures - whether she wanted to or not.
It was March 2020, and Dr. Ziyad Al-Aly felt as disoriented as everyone else. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, he was forced to work from home rather than at his office at the Washington University School of Medicine, where he is the director of clinical epidemiology, or at the Veterans Affairs St.
Chris Russell can't explain why he spends so many hours staring at a monitor, making soccer analysis videos without getting paid for it. It's probably just to "keep getting likes," he says. The popularity of Russell's videos is a sign of a growing soccer fandom in the United States.
E.A. Quinn, associate professor of biological anthropology, has received a grant from the Leakey Foundation to study how neurotropic hormones in human and primate milk affect brain growth. E.A. Quinn Humans have very large brains at birth and experience rapid periods of brain growth during infancy.
Ready for some winter fun? The St. Louis area features many ice-skating rinks open to the public, offering plenty of opportunities to lace up the skates and do some laps with the family. Enjoy the city's iconic ice rink any day of the week-no matter what the weather throws your way.
From the Civil War to the 21st century, Black women have fought to become physicians. A new book by Jasmine Brown, AB '18, tells the story of the barriers Black women pursuing a career in medicine have faced throughout history.
When it's time to volunteer, it can be a challenge to decide where to donate your time-according to one report, there are nearly 15,000 registered nonprofit organizations in the St. Louis area. Consider these 20, mostly smaller, organizations where your efforts are bound to go a long way.
(JOPLIN, Mo.) - Around 65 protesters lined both sides of Main Street in Joplin on Friday evening protesting the leaked Supreme Court opinion that outlines plans to overturn Roe vs. Wade. They held up signs and shouted, "my body, my choice" at passing cars.
(SAINT LOUIS)- Immediately following the Supreme Court 's decision in Dobbs v. Jackson's Women's Health Organization overturning Roe v. Wade, Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt issued an that triggered Missouri's House Bill 126, effectively ending abortion in the state.
The best part of Angela Sears Spittal's week is the half-hour she spends reading storybooks to a classroom of 4- and 5-year-olds. Although she's the executive director of Ready Readers, the St. Louis nonprofit that sends volunteers into 250 classrooms a week for storytime, she's dedicated to participating as a volunteer reader herself.
Matthew Bruckner and his two kids spent a Maine vacation eating wild blueberries straight from the bush. Returning home, they wondered what else they might forage. Soon the Washington, D.C., family found wild blackberries in the alley behind their house, in dirt patches around the city, and in a nearby natural urban woodland.
It was noisy. It was one of the many school snow days in February, and everyone was home, Desiree Coleman-Fry remembers. She was on a call with her boss, and one of her four children kept walking by "sounding like she had pulled out a bass drum."
THE ARTICLE Jennifer Bird meets Sister Fran Raia to discuss the decline of the Catholic clergy and how her convent prepared for their future with bold pragmatism . . . €4/month What you get: €45/year What you get: Already have an account? Login
The U.S. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau designated the "SLO coast" as California's newest American Viticultural Area (AVA) earlier this month. The area is in San Luis Obispo (SLO) county and lies on the coast in a nearly 100-mile long strip about halfway between California's two largest cities, San Francisco and Los Angeles.
In honor of Earth Day on April 22nd, meet 10 inspiring agriculture influencers who love and celebrate the earth and all its offerings. Angelique Taylor and Kip Ritchey The folks at Smarter by Nature give us a nearly daily dose of inspiration.
Billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott has pledged $50 million to youth 4-H programs. The donation is the largest in the organization's 120-year history. Scott is a novelist and philanthropist who was married to Jeff Bezos, helping him start Amazon in 1994.
Athletic Brewing Company has jumped into the light beer game with a brand new "clean, crisp, everyday" offering, Athletic Lite. Targeting athletes, drinkers who want a temporary break from alcohol and those who have given it up entirely, Athletic Lite opens up the non-alcoholic beer category to a wider audience than ever before.
We are thrilled to introduce our readers to the award-winning chef of our new culinary series, Sweet and Savory. Jodie Ferguson is the chef-owner of Clara B's Kitchen Table, a food truck (named after her grandmother) that serves food inspired by both Ferguson's Texas upbringing and her grandmother's native Louisiana one.
Pharm Table, a San Antonio-based restaurant specializing in organic, local and gluten-free meals, has won "Best Patio for Brunch" in San Antonio Magazine's Best of the City 2022 Awards. Helmed by chef Elizabeth Johnson, who the James Beard Foundation called a "food is medicine guru," Pharm Table promotes plant-forward comfort foods while eliminating inflammatory ingredients.
Oat Haus Granola Butter, the first oat-based spread, provides those with nut allergies a delicious option on their morning toast. Founded in 2018 by Ali Bonar, it was featured on the business funding competition show Shark Tank in 2021.
The Barrel-Aged Reserve Rum by Roulaison Distilling Co. has won a 2022 Good Food Award, placing in the south region. The rum is aged in casks that originally held bourbon, rye, brandy and single malt. It's put in barrels at a maximum of 110 proof to extract less bitter oak tannin and mature with more complexity.
In 2017, Army veteran Will Batie, newly diagnosed with a serious illness, needed help. He felt too sick to eat, so he visited St. Louis nonprofit Food Outreach, which has been helping people living with cancer, HIV, and diabetes access healthy food for 34 years.
James Beard honoree Greg Wade has launched a new production facility for his award-winning bread on the west side of Chicago. Publican Quality Bread is a town favorite, supplying whole-grain long-fermented loaves to over 100 of the city's top chefs and restaurants and to many independent retailers.
You've heard of plant-based diets and locavorism, but how about invasivores? In the fight for sustainability, cooks are beginning to focus on eating invasive species. The term was first used by conservation biologist and University of Vermont professor Joe Roman around 20 years ago.
Singapore-based craft brewery Brewerkz has teamed up with food tech start-up Probicient to make the world's first probiotic beer. Red Billion Probiotic Raspberry Sour Beer is a tart berry-red beer, packed with a fruity freshness of raspberries and 1 billion CFU (colony forming units) of bacteria, the minimum amount considered to be an effective probiotic.
Irish Whiskey Cask Scottish Oatmeal Stout, a beer celebrating Celtic culture, is now available in the U.S. Originally developed a decade ago by Scottish brewer Innis & Gunn to mark St. Patrick's Day, this limited-edition beer hadn't been available in the U.S. until recently.
Banza has partnered with inventor Dan Pashman for a chickpea version of cascatelli, his revolutionary pasta shape. This protein-packed, gluten-free variety will be available online and in Whole Foods stores starting in March 2022. Cascatelli, which roughly translates to "little waterfalls" in Italian, is a short pasta with a flat trough in the middle and ruffled sides, maximized to catch sauce.
LA Plaza Cocina, the country's first museum celebrating Mexican food and cooking, opened last month in Los Angeles. It is an expansion of the downtown LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes, a cultural center devoted to Mexican heritage.
Absinthia's Bottled Spirits has released Absinthia Barrel-Aged Absinthe, a new version of their award-winning Absinthia Blanche. This farm-to-glass certified organic absinthe is made with California grapes plus botanicals from Oregon, including fresh wormwood (artemisia absinthium,) star anise, fennel seed, and coriander seed. Absinthia Spirits' traditional distillation process uses copper pots and vintage Swiss recipes.
France's Director-General for Competition Policy, Consumer Affairs, and Fraud Control undertook a years-long investigation to determine if vanilla sold on the market was authentic, reported Food Ingredients First. They found that 25% of vanilla products did not comply with regulations.
Camelina sativa, or false flax as it's sometimes called, is a commonplace plant, similar to canola. Until recently, it was overlooked compared to the more popular canola, also known as rapeseed. At the moment, camelina is mainly used to produce cooking oil. It can also be used in feed for livestock and fish.
(ST. LOUIS) - Curtis McCall Jr. is about to step down as mayor of his small town, and though he doesn't relish the idea, he supports the plan that has put him out of a job. McCall Jr. broke barriers in 2015 when he was elected mayor of Cahokia, a village of about 14,000 in Southern Illinois.
Kiki Aranita and her business partner Chris Vacca poured their hearts into building a restaurant that did homage to the complex food of Kiki's Hawaiian heritage.
Have you ever thought about getting away from it all and trying your hand as an Alaskan longline fisherman? Alaska Longline Fisherman's Association (ALFA) is currently taking applications for its crew training program. The program is an effort to attract younger entrants into an industry where the average fisherman's age is 50.
In December 2020, The Kansas City Star, the city's largest newspaper, wrote a scathing article about their own past disservice to the community. At the urging of one of their reporters, Mará Rose Williams, they embarked on a 6-part investigative series, called "The Truth in Black and White," to review and correct the record on previous reporting.
Florida will produce the smallest crop of oranges in more than 75 years, reported the AP. The US Dept of Agriculture released a report in January predicting that the 2021-2022 season will yield only 44.5 million 90-pound boxes of oranges, meaning California's orange crop will exceed Florida's for the first time in years.
A recently released study showed that regular yogurt consumption is beneficial for people with hypertension. Hypertension is a major risk factor for cardiovascular disease, which is the leading cause of death worldwide. Dairy foods contain a range of micronutrients, including calcium, magnesium, and potassium, which are involved in the regulation of blood pressure.
If you are feeling nostalgic, you can visit Ben & Jerry's infamous flavor graveyard, where tributes to discontinued varieties linger on the internet. But one lucky flavor is getting a second chance with a new twist, just in time for St. Patrick's Day.
Families may soon have a device on their counter the size of a toaster oven that can make any beverage they want in a matter of minutes. It's estimated this would save the average household around 100 containers a month. After three years of development, Cana Technologies is getting ready to launch the first molecular beverage printer.
(ST. LOUIS) - A scaled back version of the annual St. Louis Mardi Gras celebration, one of the nation's largest outside of New Orleans, will go on this year despite the pandemic and freezing temperatures, organizers have said. This year, traditional events like the pet costume contest will be held online.
Chain restaurants' use of plant-based alternative meat products saved the lives of around 700,000 animals last year, reported USA TODAY. Burger King was one of the first fast-food restaurants to offer a plant-based version of their flagship sandwich, the Whopper, in 2016.
Pork producer Smithfield Foods announced a pledge to halve food losses and achieve zero-waste-to-landfill certification within eight years. They plan to meet these goals by targeting the prevention of food loss and waste before it arises, recovery of wholesome food for donation, and recycling of food loss and waste to other uses, such as animal feed, compost and energy generation.
The Plating Society, a new restaurant from Feast and Field contributor Darian Bryan, opened January 11th, 2022 in the Larkin Historic District of Buffalo, New York. The brick-and-mortar location is an expansion of the original version of the Plating Society, a boutique chef service providing fine dining events, catering and cooking classes in unique locations, from homes to yoga studios to the beach.
A cheesemaker in Estonia has found an unusual use for the juniper berries leftover from gin production. They are putting them in cheese. It was a gin distillery, Liviko, one of the largest alcohol producers in the Baltic region, who approached Andre's Cheese Farm with the idea.
For every cup of strained yogurt that's produced in our country, two cups of whey are created as a byproduct. Whey can be a problem for the environment if it enters into the waste stream. It's naturally acidic, and it can damage surrounding ecosystems by disrupting the pH of groundwater, resulting in lower crop yields, depleting oxygen levels in waterways and negatively impacting aquatic life.
The top-selling berry consumer brand, Driscoll's, has announced plans to build the first indoor vertical strawberry farm. In partnership with Plenty Unlimited Inc, the berry juggernaut plans the groundbreaking farm to serve customers in the Northeastern U.S. "The Northeast is the largest berry consumption region in the U.S., with a dense population of berry-loving customers," said Arama Kukutai, CEO at Plenty.
On March 1-5, Seed St. Louis will offer its 13th annual Community Agriculture Conference. This year's conference will have both in-person and virtual sessions, offering classes and panel discussions by experts from the agricultural community. All sessions will be free and open to the public, though registration is required.
Research contribution
Nora Villanueva Campanor sought protection from her former partner - and still ended up dead. A Times investigation shows how L.A. County's system for granting and enforcing restraining orders leaves women vulnerable to violence, even when they manage to escape from abusive relationships.
The restraining order system is "riddled with barriers and drop-out points," and can be very difficult to navigate, according to victims of domestic violence and advocates interviewed by The Times, often leaving those who seek protection more vulnerable than when they began.