Cygna

Home page for the CYGNA network

Anne-Wil Harzing - Sat 31 Dec 2016 15:29 (updated Sun 18 Oct 2026 07:43)

The name CYGNA comes from the female version of the Greek word for SWAN (Supporting Women in Academia Network). Established in June 2014, our main objective is to promote interaction among female academics and to provide a forum for learning, support, and networking. You can find out more about CYGNA by perusing this and the following 17 pages.

We organize a wide range of meetings and events (see: Overview of meeting types); the 2025-2026 academic year saw our 70th plenary meeting. For more details on our meetings see here. A quick overview of past presentations can be found here. We maintain a readings and inspirations section for female academics, and a LinkedIn page.

A write-up of our first nine years is at Cygna history; our 10-year anniversary write-up is at CYGNA 10-year. We maintain an overview of meeting blogposts and a Frequently Asked Questions page, and explain our ethos at: Mission, values & meeting charter. Newsletters are availabe for 2024-2025 and 2025-2026.

CYGNA Lead Team

CYGNA North team

Our CYGNA North team has been organizing a yearly on-site event in a location in the North of England in collaboration with NARTI.

• Axèle Giroud, University of Manchester, UK
• Martyna Śliwa, Durham University, UK [now University of Bath]
• Yingqi (Annie) Wei, University of Leeds, UK

Annie, Axèle, and Martyna (Cumberland Lodge June 2024)

Previous organization team members

These team members were part of the larger CYGNA organization team between 2023 and 2026. They were involved in the organization of our 10-year Anniversary event, organization of plenary meetings, new members meetings. Their support in co-creating CYGNA is much appreciated.

• Satkeen Azzizadeh, Middlesex University, UK
• Sylwia Ciuk, Oxford Brooks University, UK
• Joanna Karmowska, Oxford Brooks University, UK

• Heejin Kim, Tohoku University, Japan
• Ting Liu, Kyoto University, Japan
• Clarice Santos, Middlesex University, UK

Founders & first CYGNA lead team

These team members were part of the original founding team and acted as Lead Team members in the first nine years of the network.

• Argyro Avgoustaki, ESCP Business School [2014-2023], founding member
• Anne-Wil Harzing, Middlesex University [2014-current], founding member
• Ling Eleanor Zhang, ESCP Business School [2014-2023], founding member
• Shasha Zhao, University of Surrey [2017-2023]

Picture: Ling, Argyro, Anne-Wil, Shasha (ESCP Business School court yard, May 2022)

Related pages

• About Cygna - Background on the CYGNA network
• Quick overview - Overview of presentations in our meetings with linked slidedecks
• Meetings - Information about forthcoming CYGNA meetings, and links to prior years
• Membership - Information for and about the Cygna network membership
• Readings and inspirations - Inspirational readings and resources for female academics
• The Cygna charter - Documents our CYGNA charter
• Cygna videos - Repository of introduction videos of our new CYGNA coordination team
• Cygna history - Tracing the history of our network since 2014, includes links to all of our meetings
• Frequently asked questions - Everything you may want to know about the CYGNA network and more
• The SWAN project - Initiated by Christa Sathish and Clarice Santos and implemented by Jacqueline Leon Ribas, this project created two swans reflecting CYGNA’s equal, inclusive, collective identity and the diversity of the network and its members
• Conference meet-ups - Provides brief write-ups of CYGNA conference meet-ups
• 10-year Anniversary event - Programme page for our 10-year anniversary event
• International Women's Day - Our collection of posts for international women's day
• CYG: Teaching & Scholarship Research - Our first CYG = SIG = Special Interest Group
• CYG: Career stage CYGs - Introductory page for our new career stage CYGs
• Cygna Writes - Introductory page for our new CYGNA Writes initiative - Writing in Community, Achieving in Silence
• Cygna Collaborations - Reports on some of the many collaborations our swans have engaged in across the CYGNA network
• Confused? Overview of meeting types - Provides an overview of the seven different meeting types that the CYGNA Women in Academia Network currently offers

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