Keynote speakers
Andrea Szabó is an Associate Professor and Director of the English and American Studies Institute at the University of Pannonia in Veszprém, Hungary, where she has been a faculty member for over three decades. An accomplished Alice Munro scholar, her research interests lie at the intersection of Gothic Studies, Gender Studies, and Popular Culture Studies. Her expertise spans multiple disciplines, including Communication and Media, English Literature, and Teacher Education. From 2020 to 2023, she served as Director General of the Teacher Training Centre, demonstrating her commitment to educational leadership. Her scholarly work encompasses American, Canadian, and Gothic literature, with a particular focus on modern literature and gender studies.
Răzvan Săftoiu is a Professor at Transilvania University of Brașov, Romania, where he is chair of the Department of Theoretical and applied linguistics. His research focuses on pragmatics, communication, and discourse analysis. He has received research grants at the University of Bucharest (2001–2003), New York State University, Albany (2005–2006) and Transilvania University of Brașov (2007–2010, 2015–2017). He has published as a single author Limbaj în acțiune [Language in Action] (2007) and Politics through the Lens of Linguistic Analysis (2013) and co-edited, among others, the volumes Workplace Communication across Languages and Cultures (Benjamins, 2012), Persuasive Games in Political and Professional Dialogue (Benjamins, 2015) and Romanian Humor (Tertium, 2020).
