Members of Chatham University’s Sigma Tau Delta honors chapter are creating Viaduct Dialogues, an undergraduate student journal for academic work in the humanities, with a pilot issue set to debut in June.
Co-founders Dirk Wynn ‘24 and Will Grasso ‘24 were inspired to develop the journal after going to the Sigma Tau Delta convention with Hannah Klepsky ‘24 in St. Louis in April. Wynn had previously taken the Seminar in Literary Theory and Scholarly Writing, the English pre-capstone class, where he saw his peers’ small-form theory and wanted to see it taken beyond the class.
Grasso explained that they felt there was little appreciation for undergraduate student theory.
“There was like, a noticeable lack of praise for academic work among undergraduates,” they said, “and I think that it’s such a big part of the work that a lot of students do here that it seems like it was high time for it to be accepted and celebrated.”
As for what kind of work will be accepted in Viaduct Dialogues, Wynn described it as “non-generative, text-based scholarship” such as critical essays and textual analyses. There’s little limit on what the text being analyzed can be; films, music, visual art and even historical narratives are all fair game.
There are some limitations such as work being five to 10 pages with a complete work cited in MLA or APA format, but the journal is open to undergraduates from any institution, not just Chatham.
The goal is to have small-batch prints of each issue to sell at events and a website to publish a digital version. The smaller pilot issue will be the only issue that is not fully peer-reviewed. Wynn is seeking faculty from the Pittsburgh area and beyond to peer-review work for the second issue in October 2025. After that, the journal will be published every October.
The name, Viaduct Dialogues, is a nod to the journal’s Pittsburgh roots as a viaduct is a type of bridge, but it also points to something at the heart of the journal’s inception: undergraduate work is necessary if students are going to pursue theory at a higher level.
“I just thought that the cadence of Viaduct Dialogues sounded really good,” they said. “But I also like the idea of it kind of being like a bridge, the journal being a bridge between undergraduates and like the larger publishing academic community.”
The journal will have an editorial board of a Chatham alum and four students: two manuscript editors, a technical editor who will do layout and an editor-in-chief.
And while the journal is created by Chatham students, it won’t function like a typical Chatham student organization. Instead, it’s run out of Sigma Tau Delta, and all roles but the technical editor will have to be filled by members of Sigma Tau Delta.
Sigma Tau Delta is an invite-only honors society that is open to undergraduates who have completed a minimum of two college courses in English language or literature beyond the requirements of first-year English with a B or higher.
Viaduct Dialogues has already filled two roles: Wynn will be the editor-in-chief and Klepsky, now a master’s student in English at Duquesne University, will be the alum.
Wynn has experience with publishing student work as he has been the Minor Bird’s poetry editor for a year. He describes himself as a “critical guy” and sees the journal as an opportunity for students to challenge themselves.
“It’s a step up that will push undergraduates to be self-motivated and take their work outside of the institution,” he said, “which will, I mean, just prepare them so much for grad school and just curate that mindset of being an academic scholar in a day and age where that’s becoming kind of antiquated.”
If students are interested in submitting work or getting involved, a call for papers will be out in September, and those interested in applying for positions can email Wynn at [email protected].
