University of Silesia in Katowice

Katarzyna Marcol, PhD, DLitt, Associate Professor | Photo by Julia Agnieszka Szymala

Katarzyna Marcol, PhD, DLitt, Associate Professor

Cultural anthropologist, researcher of linguistically, culturally and religiously diverse communities. She specialises in linguistic anthropology, folklore studies and cultural ecology.

Professionally associated with the Cieszyn Faculty of the University of Silesia since 2000. In 2012–2016, she was the Deputy Dean for Promotion and Cooperation with the Local Community. She carries out her scientific work based on field research in Cieszyn Silesia, within its historical borders, as well as in the Serbian Banat. She analyses the linguistic construction of the image of the world, the transmission of cultural texts in multi-ethnic environments, and the impact of politics on local communities.

Magdalena Szyndler, PhD, DLitt, Associate Professor

Magdalena Szyndler, PhD, DLitt, Associate Professor

Ethnomusicologist, folklorist, pedagogue, instrumentalist in the violin class.

Currently, she is the director of the Institute of Music at the Faculty of Arts and Educational Science. She is also the director of the USil Centre for Interdisciplinary Research on Carpathian Folklore.

She participates in numerous conferences, seminars and workshops in Poland and abroad, where she promotes the musical folklore of Cieszyn Silesia. For 20 years she has been conducting research related to this region (music folklore of the Polish minority in Zaolzie and Silesian highlanders in Trójwieś, transformations of musical folklore in the present day).

Ilona Fajfer-Kruczek, PhD | Photo by Julia Agnieszka Szymala

Ilona Fajfer-Kruczek, PhD

Special educator, sociotherapist, pedagogical therapist, researcher of social exclusion and the situation of selected socially disadvantaged groups.

She has been associated with the Cieszyn Faculty since her student days, and since 2006 she has been employed in a research and teaching position. She is a co-author of pedagogical study programmes and education quality activities. She is involved in social aid for those in need, the academic community, as well as institutional cooperation – as an expert.

She has extensive professional experience in educational and therapeutic work with people with disabilities and social maladjustment.

Natalia Pawlus, PhD, DLitt, Associate Professor | Photo by Małgorzata Dymowska

Natalia Pawlus, PhD, DLitt, Associate Professor

Artist whose main interest is workshop graphics, in particular linocut, as well as drawing and painting.

Since 2008, she has been working at her alma mater – the University of Silesia. She runs a graphic arts studio and is the supervisor of the Student Art and Research Group of Woodcutters and Linocutters ‘DEHA’. She has participated in over three hundred exhibitions in Poland and abroad (individual exhibitions: Poland, Mexico, China, Czechia and Italy). Winner of awards and distinctions in the country and abroad. In 2020, she became a scholarship holder of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education ‘Scholarship for Outstanding Young Scientists’.

Since 2017, she has been cooperating with universities in China, where she conducts lectures and art classes (MIADA – Modern International Art & Design Academy, Chongqing and Zhengzhou University of Aeronautics, Art Design College, Zhengzhou).