The Midnight Seminar

The Midnight Seminar

By Tara & DougSociety & CultureHistoryPhilosophy
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The Midnight Seminar episodes

  • BONUS: Which is Scarier - Round 2

    Tara and Doug usher in Spooky Season with another round of Which is Scarier, the game that asks you...which is scarier...

    Participate in the fun by playing along at home and looking for polls on Instagram (@themidnightseminar), or write in to tell us why we're wrong or right!
    43 min
  • All Things Odd with Author J.W. Ocker
    Award-winning author J.W. Ocker joins Tara (a long-time fan) to talk about traveling to strange places, writing about horror and history, and his forthcoming book on Sleepy Hollow, a place (and legend) they both love!
     
    Check out Ocker's books! He has written middle-grade and adult horror fiction as well as non-fiction essential for any spooky soul.
     
    Author's Website: https://www.oddthingsiveseen.com/
     
    Where to Buy the Books: https://bookshop.org/shop/jwocker
     
    Pre-order a copy of Chasing the Headless Horseman: The History, Hijinks, and Halloweens of the Real Sleepy Hollow, and, if you can make it to Sleepy Hollow, stop by his book signings or get your tickets to one of Ocker's upcoming events: 
     
    Book Talk @ Lyndhurst Mansion (9/19): https://lyndhurst.org/events/ocker-book-talk/
     
    Sleepy Hollow Fact & Fiction @ Tarrytown Music Hall (10/10): https://tickets.tarrytownmusichall.org/eventperformances.asp?evt=3227
    1 hr 12 min
  • Internet Horror

    Take a trip down memory lane to reminisce about cursed email chains, creepypastas, and the ghosts in our machines. Doug and Tara discuss how the Internet has spawned and spread horror stories as digital folklore and, more recently, in mainstream media and entertainment. Some movies come up, but they're not spoiled! Click the links below at your own risk.

     
    Pop-up video that broke Tara: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYTrbDLSy_w
    The Rake: https://creepypasta.fandom.com/wiki/The_Rake
    Slenderman: https://theslenderman.fandom.com/wiki/Slender_Man
    Russian Sleep Experiment: https://creepypasta.fandom.com/wiki/The_Russian_Sleep_Experiment
    The Chair: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhazCS14Tas
     
    Other References:
    "Bored at Work? Try Creepypasta, or Web Scares" by Austin Considine, New York Times, Nov 12, 2010.
    https://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/14/fashion/14noticed.html?searchResultPosition=1
     
    "How Slender Man Became a Legend" by Gabe Cohn, New York Times, Aug 15, 2018.
    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/15/movies/slender-man-timeline.html 
     
    "Talk to Me Is Horror Made by and for the Internet Generation" by Eric Ravenscraft, WIRED, July 19, 2023. https://www.wired.com/story/talk-to-me-movie-review/
    1 hr 29 min
  • Campfire Tales

    Tara is joined by Dr. Christopher Smith (christopherclaytonsmith.com)--friend, colleague, and horror buff--to discuss the enduring tradition of campfire tales and even tell some of the classics. Pull up a log and enjoy a story that involves spooks, slashers, and the Boy Scouts of America. 

     
    There's some "movie talk" in this episode, particularly about the Friday the 13th and Sleepaway Camp franchises. Spoilers are signaled in the dialogue, mild for Friday the 13th(s) and major for Sleepaway Camp(s). If you want to learn more about the politics and implications of the movies we discuss here, we recommend the podcasts You Are Good with hosts Alex Steed and Sarah Marshall, and This Ends at Prom with hosts BJ Colangelo and Harmony Colangelo. The Midnight Seminar does not have an association with these shows, although if the hosts ever see this and want to be friends, please get in touch.
     

    Our New Website: https://themidnightseminar.com/

    Our New Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/themidnightseminar

     
    Other References:
     
    "How Conversations Around Campfires Came To Be" by Robin I. M. Dunbar, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2014: https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.1416382111. 
     
    See links on the Wikipedia page for "Campfire Story" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campfire_story), specifically "Campfire Stories: Sleeper Tells of Release," The Delta Independent (Colorado), June 7, 1912: https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn86063206/1912-06-07/ed-1/?sp=7&r=-0.036,-0.275,1.223,0.586,0 
     
    Boy Scouts Handbook, first edition (1911): https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/29558/pg29558-images.html 
     
    Playing Indian by Philip J. Deloria
     
    "URBAN LEGENDS" and the Urban Legend Hotline episodes of the American Hysteria podcast with host Chelsea Weber-Smith
     
    "Urban Legends Spectacular!" and "Urban Legends and Urban Legend (1998) with Chelsea Weber-Smith" on theYou're Wrong About podcast with host Sarah Marshall
     
    The Encyclopedia of Urban Legends by Jan Harold Brunvand
     
    "The Hook and Other Teenage Horrors" in The Vanishing Hitchhiker: American Urban Legends and Their Meanings by Jan Harold Brunvand
     
    Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz (Drawings by Stephen Gammell)
     
    Meatballs (1979) campfire story scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuWjXrFh1qQ
    1 hr 48 min
  • The Monster of Lake Champlain

    Tara tells Doug about her favorite American monster while also delivering a Crash Course on cryptids. If you thought monster legends were all about conspiracies and hoaxes, think again!

     
    References: 
    The United States of Cryptids: A Tour of American Myths and Monsters by J.W. Ocker
    The Untold Story of Champ: A Social History of America's Loch Ness Monster by Robert E. Bartholomew 
    "New Information Surfaces on 'World's Best Lake Monster Photo,' Raising Questions," by Robert E. Bartholomew (Skeptical Inquirer, 2013)
    Champ: Beyond the Legend by Joseph W. Zarzynski 
    Plesiosaurs 101, National Geographic (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkw593Qa19U)
    Nessie Photos: "The Loch Ness Monster Turns 83: The Story of the Surgeon's Photograph" by Kat Kiernan (Don't Take Pictures, 2017) (https://www.donttakepictures.com/dtp-blog/2017/4/19/the-loch-ness-monster-turns-83-the-story-of-the-surgeons-photograph) 
     
    Recommendations:
    Frogman (2023), directed by Anthony Cousins
    Wild Thing (a Foxtopus podcast), Season One with host Laura Krantz
    1 hr 39 min
  • Third Man Syndrome (Part 2)

    Doug and Tara jump back into trying to decipher Third Man Syndrome, plus related matters of material and mind. This part includes a discussion of the scientific theories that psychologists have presented to help explain sensed presences and the particular case of the mysterious so-called Third Man. 

     
    Sources:
    The Third Man Factor: Surviving the Impossible by John Geiger 
    "Belief in Angels and Heaven is More Common Than Belief in the Devil or Hell," from the Associated Press and NORC at the University of Chicago
    They Survived: A Study of the Will to Survive by Wilfrid Noyce
    Peter Suedfeld and John Geiger, "The sensed presence as a coping resource in extreme environments," in: Miracles God, Science, and Psychology in the Paranormal, edited by J. Harold Ellens
    Presence: The Strange Science and True Stories of the Unseen Other by Ben Alderson-Day
    The Voices Within: The History and Science of How We Talk to Ourselves by Charles Fernyhough
    "The Science of the Voices in your Head--with Charles Fernyhough," from the Royal Institute: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95otBlepVHc&t=1754s 
    Olaf Blanke, Polona Pozeg, Masayuki Hara, Lukas Heydrich, Andrea Serino, Akio Yamamoto, Toshiro Higuchi, Roy Salomon, Margitta Seeck, Theodor Landis, Shahar Arzy, Bruno Herbelin, Hannes Bleuler, Giulio Rognini, "Neurological and Robot-Controlled Induction of an Apparition," Current Biology 24.22 (2014): https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(14)01212-3
     
    For More on Third Man Syndrome, see also:
    Astonishing Legends Podcast (with Scott Philbrook and Forrest Burgess): The Third Man Syndrome, Parts 1 and 2 (episodes 279 and 280)
    1 hr 33 min
  • Third Man Syndrome (Part 1)

    In this first part, Tara tells Doug about a strange phenomenon colloquially called "Third Man Syndrome," in which experiencers sense a helpful presence at their side in extreme survival scenarios. The presence helps them out of trouble and then vanishes as quickly as it came. You might not see it or hear it, but you'll feel it. But is it real?

     
    Tara and Doug use a few stories of so-called "Third Men" to open up questions about the nature of reality and the power of the human mind. Part 2 will introduce the leading scientific theories about what causes this high-stakes imaginary friend to visit in the most desperate circumstances...
     
    Sources:
    The Waste Land by T.S. Eliot 
    Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing
    South: The Endurance Expedition by Ernest Shackleton
    The Varieties of Religious Experience by William James
    Camp Six: The 1933 Everest Expedition by Frank Smythe
    Touching the Void: The True Story of One Man's Miraculous Survival by Joe Simpson
    The Third Man Factor: Surviving the Impossible by John Geiger 
    "Third Man Syndrome," EBSCO: https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/psychology/third-man-syndrome 
     
    This site reproduces many of the pictures from the Shackleton Expedition:
    https://www.coolantarctica.com/Antarctica%20fact%20file/History/Ernest_Shackleton_pictures.php
    1 hr 27 min
  • Killer Plants (Part 2)
    To the Cold War and beyond! In Part 2, Doug and Tara cover the iconic plant monsters of the midcentury and ponder the meaning of the plant-human hybrid trope, what it's like to be a plant, and what might be coming next in plant horror.
     
    Sources:
     
    T. S. Miller, “Lives of the Monster Plants: The Revenge of the Vegetable in the Age of Animal Studies,” The Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts 23.3 (2012): 460-479.
     
    Victoria Brown, "The Roots of Evil: Botanical Horror" at https://www.thefrightclubni.com/post/the-roots-of-evil-botanical-horror 
     
    Peter V. Minorsky "The 'Plant Neurobiology' Revolution" at https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11085955/#abstract1
    1 hr 25 min
  • Killer Plants (Part 1)

    Your hosts start discussing killer plants in mythology, history, and popular culture. Part 1 covers the roots (literal and figurative) of the genre of "botanical horror" as it developed from ancient times through the nineteenth century. There's much to ponder about the possibilities, perils, and power of plants! Part 2 will pick up with the iconic Cold War literary and silver screen plant monsters. 

     
    References: 
    The Secret Life of Plants by Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird
    The Occult, Witchcraft & Magic: An Illustrated History by Christopher Dell
    A History of Magic, Witchcraft & the Occult by Suzannah Lipscomb, Sophie Page, Thomas Cussans, John Farndon, Ann Kay, and Philip Parker
    Library of Congress Blogs: Green Man (https://blogs.loc.gov/folklife/category/green-man/?loclr=blogflt) 
    The History of the Great Irish Famine of 1847, with Notices of Earlier Irish Famines by the Rev. John O'Rourke, P.P., M.R.I.A. (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14412)
    1 hr 35 min
  • Caves: Spooks, Survival, and Science

    Doug is out but will return soon; Tara is instead joined by her awesome friend Jesse, who knows all about caves. They discuss what makes caves creepy for loads of people, from mummified bats and myths of monsters who lurk in the dark to the realities of complicated rescue missions. They also talk about why caves should be appreciated and respected as places of awe and wonder, inspired science, and longstanding cultural importance. Don't listen to this one in a cramped, dark space (or do)!


    Resource:

    https://nckri.org/caves/ (National Cave and Karst Research Institute)

    1 hr 35 min

About The Midnight Seminar

From the publisher's feed

Join Tara, a historian, and Doug, a philosopher, as they dive into the dark corners of culture, horror, folklore, and all things spooky. Blending sharp historical insight with deep philosophical…