The Signum Scene

Apr 14 2025 126 ep. 68 mins 171

The Signum Scene Podcast artwork

The Signum Scene podcast covers Signum University news, Signum Symposia, and creator chats from Signum Plaza—engaging talks on literature for fans and scholars. Featuring event updates, faculty chats, MA student thesis presentations, and interviews with leading academics and creators, it offers something for everyone.

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Storyweb 000 - Trailer

Apr 14 2025 1 mins

Introducing Storyweb, a new series of chats with authors and creators from the Signum Plaza.Support The Signum Scene

Storyweb 001 - Sparrow Alden

Apr 14 2025 39 mins

In this inaugural episode of the Storyweb series, Christopher Bartlett interviews Sparrow Alden about her history and process as a writer. They discuss A Flash of Wings, Sparrow’s anthology of flash fiction that appears in the Signum University Collaboratory. https://collaboratory.signumuniversity.org/library/37Support The Signum Scene

State of the University Address, 2024

Dec 30 2024 93 mins

Join President Corey Olsen for a look at the year that has been and a discussion of Signum's direction in 2025 and beyond! Please consider supporting Signum University. https://signumuniversity.org/news/find-joy-learn-the-things-that-you-love/ https://signumuniversity.org/support/donate/ More about Signum University https://signumuniversity.org/new-here/ https://signumunivers

Thesis Theater: Jay Moses, "Seedbed Of Darkness: M.R. James, Folk Horror, And 17th Century England"

Nov 17 2024 58 mins

This recording from November 1, 2024. Signum University presents Thesis Theater with Jay Moses on Saturday, November 1, 2024 at 5pm ET. M.R. James was recognized and acclaimed for his short stories of the macabre written at the turn of the twentieth century. In the 1970’s the new genre of Folk Horror arose, basing many of its stories within the England countryside, and claiming

Thesis Theater: Peter DeVault, "Illuminating the Metrical Grammar of Germanic Alliterative Poetry"

Oct 14 2024 59 mins

This recording from September 28, 2024. Signum University presents Thesis Theater with Peter DeVault on Saturday, September 28, 2024 at 10am ET. Modern metrical analysis of Germanic alliterative poetry (GAP) has invariably proceeded from edited texts in which the poem is represented visually as verses on a printed page or screen. Of course, that is not how these poems came down t

Thesis Theater: Julia Stowe, "Time and Eternity in 8-10th c. West Germanic Language and Literature"

Sep 17 2024 66 mins

This recording from September 9, 2024. Signum University presents Thesis Theater with Julia Stowe on Saturday, September 14, 2024 at 10am ET. The concepts of time and eternity, and the words that are used to express them, have significant influence over a culture. This thesis examines how the understanding of these concepts changed in early Germanic culture with the introduction

Thesis Theater: Robert Black, "Beowulf as a Christian Critique of Germanic Heroism"

Aug 16 2024 61 mins

This recording from August 10, 2024. Signum University presents Thesis Theater with Robert Black on Saturday, August 10, 2024 at 4pm ET. This paper proposes to compare once again the heroes Beowulf and Böðvarr Bjarki, using linguistics and critiques of the heroes to build on the traditional approaches of comparison through folktale, etymological, and literary analysis to examin

Thesis Theater: Celesta Clegg, "Original Sin: A Portrait of the Fall Through Germanic Texts”

Jul 21 2024 69 mins

This recording from July 13, 2024. Signum University presents Thesis Theater with Celesta Clegg on Saturday, July 13, 2024 at 5pm ET. Germanic reworkings of Genesis material present a glimpse into the Christian doctrine and societal understandings of the medieval culture in which the texts were composed. This thesis serves as an analysis and synthesis of the topic of original sin

Thesis Theater: Trevor Brierly, "Tolkien's Vision of Faërie in 'Smith of Wooton Major'"

May 13 2024 57 mins

This recording from May 7, 2024. Signum University Graduate School presents Thesis Theater with Trevor Brierly on Tuesday, May 7, 2024 at 2pm ET, on the subject of Tolkien's "Vision of Faërie" in "Smith of Wootton Major." Tolkien's story "Smith of Wootton Major", written in 1965, and an accompanying essay written at the same time, provide a

Thesis Theater: Shannon Choudhari, "Notion Club Papers and Tolkien’s Vision of Creative Mysticism"

May 13 2024 46 mins

This recording from May 10, 2024. Signum University Graduate School presents Thesis Theater with Shannon Choudhari on Tuesday, May 10, 2024 at 5pm ET. “I wonder what you’ve been up to?”: The Notion Club Papers and Tolkien’s Vision of Creative Mysticism Since it’s publication in 1992, Tolkien’s unfinished time-travel story The Notion Club Papers has received relativel