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New academic year for 16 scholars from 4 continents at PIASt

Alexander Rodrigues de Castro from Brazil, Edward Waysband and Naomi Mandel from Israel, Sinkwan Cheng from Hong Kong, Pascal Dubourg Glatigny from France, Darya Malyutina and Mikhail Khorkov from Russia, and many others, will run their projects in Poland as fellowship holders of the Polish Institute of Advanced Studies (PIASt). On 25 October the Institute officially celebrated the beginning of 2017-18 academic year.


The Institute, established on the initiative of Prof. Przemysław Urbańczyk, PIASt Director, allows foreign scholars, representing the Humanities and Social Sciences, to carry out research projects in Warsaw. Following the example of foreign institutions, such as  the European Institute of Advanced Study (EURIAS) and Network of European Institutes for Advanced Study (NetIAS), scholars are offered 5 or 10-month fellowship programs. The fellows are selected by the Scientific Advisory Board, which evaluates their scientific achievements and research proposals.

First four fellows, invited to run their projects at PIASt in previous academic year, were neuropsychologist and neurolinguist Prof. Victor Rosenthal from Marcel Mauss Institute in Paris, Ian Wood Professor of Medieval History from the University of Leeds, Riccardo Pozzo Professor of History of Philosophy from the University of Verona, and historian Dr. Michael Esch from the University of Leipzig. In 2017-18 academic year, 16 scholars from 4 continents will work in the Institute, offering fellowships in two categories: Junior (at least 2 years of full-time research experience after doctoral degree) and Senior (at least 10 years of research experience after doctoral degree).

A number of foreign scholars, who were already in Warsaw, had the possibility to introduce themselves during the ceremony inaugurated by Prof. Jerzy Duszyński and Prof. Przemysław Urbańczyk. The PAS President  and PIASt Director emphasized in their speeches the importance of opening the Institute in tightening up cooperation and exchanging experiences between Polish and foreign researchers. The following fellowship holders were present at the ceremony:

Alexander Rodrigues de Castro, legal historian and theorist from Brazil, whose field of interest is the penal code in the face of development of liberalism in the early 19th century and the formation of criminal law in Europe and South America;

Edward Waysband from Israel, whose research interest encompass early 20th century Russian and Eastern European literature, Polish-Russian-Jewish relations, literature and identity (including the context of diaspora and exile), nationalism and ethnic minority studies;

Sinkwan Cheng from Hong Kong, studying relations between concept of linear time, modernity and contributions made by translation of Western texts to China's modernization process;

Pascal Dubourg Glatigny, historian of art. and architecture from France, exploring the ways in which visual arts contributed to the creation of a community in Renaissance cities, particularly interested in Zamość (due to his stay in Poland);

Naomi Mandel from Israel, whose wide range of interdisciplinary research focuses on literature and film and their relations with contemporary culture and philosophy.

The majority of new PIASt fellowship holders are scholars from Russia: Darya Malyutina (human geography), Sergey Toymentsev (comparative literature), Vladislav Inozemtsev (economy), and Mikhail Khorkov (history and philosophy).

Polish researchers, who have not worked in their homeland for the last three years, may also apply for fellowships. This year Dr. Anna Szołucha was awarded PIASt fellowship.
Dr. Anna Szołucha studied International Relations and Political Science in St Andrews, she defended her PhD, on the Occupy movement in Ireland and San Francisco, at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth. She joined the ERC-Advanced Grant project at the University of Bergen in Norway to explore the intersections of energy and democracy in the context of shale gas developments and renewable energy initiatives in the UK and Poland. Dr. Szołucha’s research interests focus on renewable resources, social movements, impact of energy developments on the environment and society, as well as the conditions of technosocial possibility of new energy projects and the current transmutations of the “corporate state”.