Commission on Classical Philology

The commission combines representatives of a variety of humanities disciplines who are interested in broad issues of Greco-Roman antiquity and its reception in the culture of mediaeval and modern Europe. Hence it brings together Hellenists and Latinists specialising in history and literature as well as in linguistics (classical linguistics), including Byzantinists, neo-Latinists, historians of antiquity, historians of ancient culture and philosophy, scholars of patristics, archaeologists, numismatists, scholars of ancient – mainly Roman – law, and scholars of the reception of antiquity in European culture and literature – especially in Polish culture and literature. The Classics Commission publishes its proceedings, in the form of collectively written papers, annually. The PAU series Library of Translations from Ancient Literature is connected with its publishing activities. Since 2012, it has published the journal New Philomath: a Journal Devoted to Ancient Culture, which it took over from the Jagiellonian University.

Go to:  „Nowy Filomata. Czasopismo poświęcone kulturze antycznej” ("New Philomath: a Journal of Ancient Culture")

Commission Members

Commission on Modern Languages

Commission on Modern Languages was established on the initiative of Przemysław Mroczkowski. It was formally brought into existence in 1997. Sadly, the professor’s health did not permit him to begin the work of the commission energetically, so that its first gathering, convened to discuss organisation, did not take place until November 1998. It was led by Olga Dobijanka-Witczakowa in the role of deputy chair with Przemyslaw Mroczkowski as chair. The meeting elected Stanisław Widłak as secretary. The commission’s first scientific meeting, which was devoted to a discussion of the Polish Modern Languages Congress, which had taken place a month earlier in Łódź, was held in December 1998. Regular meetings of the commission with papers and a discussion began in January 1999. This year was also the year in which a common programme of action was developed, corresponding to the interests of the representatives of the various modern languages in terms of both literary studies and linguistics.
The first year of the commission’s existence yielded volume I of Proceedings of the PAU Modern Languages Commission, which appeared in 2000 and contained eight articles. Further volumes appeared fairly regularly in the following years, which demonstrated that the commission had established itself as an academic body producing work consistently. The volumes record the lectures and contributions from the floor of permanent members of the commission as well as of numerous guests attending from Kraków or invited from Poland and abroad. Olga Dobijanka-Witczakowa became chair of the commission in autumn 1999 and led it with energy and enthusiasm – devoting a great deal of time to the preparation of successive volumes of the commission’s proceedings – until her death in 2006. The commission members then selected Stanislaw Widlak as chair. Working with vice-chair, Marta Gibińska, and secretary, Barbara Sosień, he organised the commission’s meetings and edited its proceedings. In 2015, he was prevented by ill health from continuing these endeavours. At a meeting in autumn 2015, the commission members elected Barbara Sosień as chair, Marta Gibińska as vice-chair, and Ewa Łukaszyk as secretary. Since 2018, the latter function has been performed by Stanislaw Jasionowicz. In 2021, he became vice-chair of the commission, while Monika Coghen was chosen as secretary.
The commission is populated largely by scholars from the Jagiellonian University and the Pedagogical University of Krakow. Its meetings are always open to all, and all those who attend are invited to contribute to the discussions.  In 2019-2021, under the working title of The Language of the Dancing Body, the commission worked successfully on a project addressing the phenomenon of dance in literature and culture. The project, which highlights the comparative and interdisciplinary aspects of the commission, will produce a multi-author monograph. 

Go to Proceedings of the PAU Modern Languages Commission.

Commission Members

Commission on the Culture of the Slavs

The nature of this commission, which was founded in 2000, is to some degree interdisciplinary because some of its areas of activity overlap with those of Faculty II. This means that, in addition to linguists studying Slavic languages, it has also contained archaeologists, historians, and ethnographers. The proceedings of the commission have appeared under the editorship of Lucjan Suchanek since 2001. Volume I: Rosyjskie bajki ludowe ze zbioru Aleksandra Afanasjewa [Russian Folk Tales from the Collection of Aleksander Afanasjew], is a selection of annotated fairy tales, while the volumes that followed it have been monothematic works written by multiple authors, See the webpage of the journal "Kultura Słowian. Rocznik Komisji Kultury Słowian PAU" [The Culture of the Slavs: Yearbook of the PAU Slavonic Culture Commission] at:

• Polska Akademia Umiejętności
• Scientific Journals Online ejournals.eu

Commission Members

PAU Art History Commission

The commission for enquiry into art history was formed in 1873 and became the major forum for the development of the discipline in Poland. Its series of publications include "Reports of the Commission for Enquiry into Art History in Poland" (nine volumes; 1877–1915; Links to digital version) and Proceedings of the PAU Art History Commission (ten volumes; 1917–1952). In 1964-1995 this commission operated as the Commission for the Theory and History of Art of the Kraków Branch of PAN and issued the annual "Folia Historiae Artium" (thirty volumes; 1964–1994) during that period.  In 1995 it became part of the PAU structure and continued to issue Folia Historiae Artium (from 1995, New Series, eighteen volumes to date).
The research topics presented at the commission’s meetings concern Polish and European art from antiquity to recent times. The presentations require both a solid grounding in methodology and an in-depth account of the topic based on a command of the subject literature. Papers are often presented by researchers from various Polish universities as well as from abroad who are not members of the commission. Its conferences and sessions are very popular among young art historians.
The most interesting papers appear in the commission’s scholarly publication: the annual "Folia Historiae Artium", which is supported by the Lanckoroński Foundation.  Digital versions of all of these volumes are available online ((https://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/fha; volumes 13-18 of the New Series can be found at: http://pau.krakow.pl/index.php/pl/wydawnictwo/strony-czasopism/folia-historiae-artium).
Prof. dr hab. Wojciech Bałus is its academic editor.

Go to the webpage of „Folia Historiae Artium”.

Commission Members

Commission on Communication Ethics

The Communication Ethics Commission was formed in 2019. Its predecessors were the Ethical Language Observatory of Warsaw University, which was established in 2013, and the Ethical Language Team at the Council for the Polish language (under the auspices of PAN), which existed from 2016–2019.  We owe the formation of the Communication Ethics Commission to the efforts of Jadwiga Puzynina – its honorary chair – and Lucjan Suchanek. It brings together linguists concerned with the study of language from an ethical perspective – in its relation to the values that underpin our culture and, in particular, the values on which communities are built and the ways in which they are expressed, sustained, and invalidated.
To treat the participants in it as subjects is considered a basic condition for ethical communication and language users should be persuaded to adopt this attitude. The commission organises conferences and seminars. It is also involved in educational initiatives, which it believes create awareness of the responsible use of language and can halt its degradation as an instrument of communication and mitigate the effects of dangerous speech, hate, aggression, and verbal violence.

Commission Members