Dr. Seuk Wai PHOONG is an Associate Professor in the Department of Decision Science, Faculty of Business and Economics, Universiti Malaya, Malaysia. She is a member of the Malaysian Mathematical Science Society (PERSAMA). Her research interests include applied statistics, econometrics, time series analysis, bibliometric analysis, and education. She has led 8 research projects out of 24 research grants. She has published papers in various WoS and Scopus journals, such as Sage Open, Artificial Intelligence Review, Humanities and Social Science, Mathematics, International Journal of Mobile Communications, Environmental Science and Pollution Research, Energies, Symmetry, Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, etc. She is also an academic editor for several journals, including PLOS One, Asian Journal of Business and Accounting, and SAGE Open. She teaches Business Statistics and Quantitative Analysis for Business at the undergraduate level; Research Methodology, Statistical Analysis, and Operational Research at the postgraduate level.

Dr Makmor Tumin is a Professor at the Department of Political Science, Public Administration and Development Studies, specializing in Political Science, focusing on Political Philosophy (Islam and the West) and Civil Society. Having served under Universiti Malaya since 1997, there are 55 books credited under his name. Several selected published books of his include Essentials of Theology and Muslim Political Philosophy, Western Political and Economic Thought, Contemporary Western Political Philosophy: Figures and Metaphysics, Contemporary Islamic Political Thought: Syariah and Philosophical Leaning (co-editor) and Civil Society in Malaysia: Issues and Challenges (edited), all of which are in Malay. He has more than 40 indexed (WoS/Scopus) papers published under his name. A list of several selected papers are as below: Rasiah, R., Noh, A., Tumin, M. 2009. Privatising healthcare in Malaysia: Power, policy and profits. J Contemp Asia 39(1): 50-62. (WoS) Rasiah, R., Tumin, M., Musafar Hameed, L., Ndoma, I. 2017. Civil society organizations in opposition to healthcare commercialization: Protecting access for the poor and middle class in Malaysia. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 45(5): 1-19. (WoS) Tumin, M., Che Soh, M. (2020). Sumbangan Tradisi Barat dan Islam Terhadap Idea Masyarakat Sivil (Contributions of Western and Islamic Traditions to the Idea of Civil Society). Journal of Aqidah and Islamic Thought (AFKAR), 22(2), 77-118. (Scopus) Che Soh M., Tumin M. (2022). Full Paying Patient Services in Malaysia: A Counter-Hegemonic Response from a Civil Society Organization, Management and Accounting Review. 21(1), 23-39. (Scopus) Rabaia, I.S.I., Tumin, M., Yeoh, E. K. K. (2017). Religion and revolution: Theorizing of the Arab Spring in accordance with the selectorate approach. Asian Politics & Policy, 9 (2), 222-44. (Scopus) Other publications include more than 20 book chapters and more than 20 non-Scopus/ISI indexed papers plus book reviews (more than 30) and popular media articles (more than 100). In the past, Dr Makmor Tumin has engaged his work on research relating to public health, focusing on policies related to organ donation and transplantation. He himself is a kidney transplant patient. Dr. Makmor is blind. His eyesight began to deteriorate at the age of 11, and at 45, he became completely blind. He is currently serving as an Executive Board member of the ASEAN University Network - Disability and Public Policy (AUN-DPPnet) and the Chief Editor for a People with Disabilities (PwDs) Magazine ("Mainstreamer") which is funded by the Nippon Foundation under AUN-DPPnet.

I am currently a Lecturer at the Department of Arabic Language and Middle Eastern Languages, Faculty of Languages and Linguistics, Universiti Malaya (UM), Malaysia. My academic and professional trajectory has been shaped by sustained engagements with the Arabic language and linguistics, translation, interpreting, and the pragmatics of cross-cultural communication. I am now reading for a PhD in Translation and Interpreting (Interpreting Studies) at Universiti Sains Malaysia, where I explore the intricacies of (im)politeness in Arabic-English simultaneous interpreting. My research investigates how interpreters navigate shifts in (im)politeness strategies under real-time cognitive constraints. Positioned at the intersection of pragmatics, interpreting studies, cognitive linguistics, and cognitive psychology, this work aims to illuminate the interplay between linguistic (im)politeness, real-time cross-cultural mediation, and the psychological demands of interpreting in high-stakes settings. This doctoral inquiry builds upon my MA in Linguistics from UM, where I examined implicature in the Quran through a pragmatic lens, sharpening my sensitivity to inferencing, intention, and context in meaning-making. My foundational training began with a BA in Arabic Language and Linguistics from Cadi Ayyad University, Morocco, where I graduated with distinction (comparable to summa cum laude in Western academic systems) and was honoured as the university's Best Student in 2019. These academic foundations laid the critical groundwork for my current scholarly focus. Beyond academia, I am a certified translator with the Institut Terjemahan & Buku Malaysia (ITBM; Malaysian Institute of Translation & Books), with extensive experience in translating, editing, and proofreading scholarly texts, theses, and books. I welcome insights most notably from language service providers and industry stakeholders to support research on interpreter ethics, translator/interpreter training, and discourse in professional translation and interpreting contexts.