Alexandre Loktionov, Ph.D.

Research Fellow, Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge

Alex Loktionov is an Egyptologist and a legal historian of the ancient world. He is based in Cambridge, where he is a Fellow of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research and also holds Bye-Fellowships at Christ’s College and Lucy Cavendish College. Outside Cambridge, Alex is Professor of Egyptology at the Institute for Oriental and Classical Studies, HSE University (Moscow) and a Visiting Senior Research Fellow at the Department of Political Economy at King’s College, London. He holds BA, MPhil and PhD degrees from Cambridge and is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Title of Speech: Ancient Law, Modern Ideas: Pharaonic Power and the History of Statehood

Yu Sang, Ph.D.

Lecturer, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, The University of Sydney

Dr. Yu Sang is an Academic Fellow in Chinese Studies at the University of Sydney. She holds a PhD awarded by the Australian National University (2019) and an MA (Research) awarded by the University of Sydney (2012). Her research focuses on Chinese philosophy and religion, in particular Buddhism and New Confucianism, and the intellectual history of modern China. Her first book (2020) presents a detailed analysis of how Xiong Shili 熊十力 (1885–1968)—a founding figure of the modern New Confucian school—established and developed his metaphysical system in the early twentieth century.

Title of Speech: Jiaohua through Humanistic Buddhism

Enrique Mallen, Ph.D.

Professor, Sam Houston State University

Dr. Enrique Mallen is Professor at Sam Houston State University. He received his PhD. in Linguistics from Cornell University. He regularly teaches courses on language, linguistics, art and culture. He has published numerous articles on linguistics, art and literature. Among his most recent publications are the books Pablo Picasso and Dora Maar: A Period of Conflict (1936-1946) (2021) and Pablo Picasso: The Aphrodite Period (1924-1936) (2020).

Title of Speech: Language Learning and Vocabulary Acquisition

Elaine Chapman, Ph.D.

Associate Professor, University of Western Australia

Elaine Chapman has an undergraduate degree in psychology (First-class honours, won Australian Psychological Society Award for the best performance in her university) and a PhD in psychology. She has taught in the areas of child and educational psychology, assessment, quantitative research design, and statistics over the last 20 years in 3 different universities (Monash, USyd, and UWA). She is passionate about child and educational psychology, and in particular, about enhancing the lives of children and youth in the affective domain. She has supervised many Doctoral and Master's students who have joined her group to pursue research in this area.

Title of Speech: Challenges of Emerging Technologies such as Generative Al in Assessment Task Design: Addressing Questions in Asystematic Way

Chinny Nzekwe-Excel, Ph.D.

Associate Professor, Faculty of Business, Law and Social Sciences, Birmingham City University

Dr. Chinny Nzekwe-Excel is an experienced academic with significant subject expertise in the broad areas of Management Development Initiatives & Repositioning Strategies; International Business; Leadership Concepts; Operations Management Research; Teaching & Learning Innovations; Work-based Learning; and Construction Management. She is also a Statistics Expert; a Senior Fellow of the Advance Higher Education, UK; a Certified Management & Business Educator; and a Leadership and Management Professional.

Chinny is an Associate Professor in Enterprise and Corporate Development. She is the Program Director of the Help to Grow Management, and the Program Director of the Senior Leader Apprenticeship at Birmingham City University, UK. She has strategic involvements with wider & global higher education platforms and has published well over 50 research outputs in leading academic journals & conference/ scholarly networks.

Chinny's research outputs have continued to gain wide attention and international recognition including the Highly Commended Emeralds Literati Networks award. She serves as an editor and a reviewer in several peer-reviewed journals including the Built Environment, Project & Asset Management; Innovations in Education and Teaching Journal; International Journal of Learning; Research & Development, Science Publishing Group.

Javier Cifuentes-Faura, Ph.D.

Researcher, Department of Financial Economics and Accounting, University of Murcia

Javier Cifuentes-Faura works in the Department of Financial Economics and Accounting at the University of Murcia (Spain). He graduated in Business Administration and Management from the University of Murcia with the Extraordinary End of Degree Award and the best grade of the promotion. He has completed postgraduate studies such as the Master in Business Administration MBA and the Master in Commercial and Marketing Management at the European Business School of Barcelona, both with Cum Laude recognition for academic excellence. He has been awarded the "Economics and Business 2018" prize by the Official Association of Economists. His lines of research include those related to public administration and economics, business, education, and those related to sustainability and environment. He is a member of the work plan of the EDINSOST2 project: Integration of sustainable development objectives in sustainability education in Spanish university degrees. He has published in JCR and Scopus impact journals, such as Educational Review, Social Indicators Research, Evaluation Review or Journal of Policy Modeling. He has participated in several international conferences, being invited to some of them as keynote speaker.

Nafhesa Ali, Ph.D.

Lecturer, Department of Social Sciences, Northumbria University

Dr. Nafhesa Ali is a Lecturer in Sociology at Northumbria University and is an interdisciplinary Sociologist with expertise in the everyday lives of racialized and minority communities. Nafhesa's interest include ageing, migration, sexualities and environmental sustainability. Her forthcoming book titled Older South Asian women's experiences of ageing in the UK: Intersectional feminist perspectives will be published with Palgrave Macmillan. Nafhesa's previous publications include on co-authored book Storying Relationships (2021), and edited collection A Match Made in Heaven: British Muslim Women write about Love and Desire (2020) and several journal publications in Sexualities, Ethnicities, Ethnic and Racial Studies and Cultural Geographies.

Nafhesa has previously worked at the various UK institutions which include the University of Huddersfield, University of Sheffield and the University of Manchester. Nafhesa's other roles include lead for the Power and Intersecting Identities (PII) Research Cluster Group at Northumbria University and Honorary SCI Fellow at the University of Manchester.