Ronald Sultana memorial lecture : a Mediterranean spirit for education : working for Ronald’s legacy

Abstract

Dear colleagues, dear friends, I want to sincerely thank Louise, Colin and all the colleagues from the Faculty of Education for initiating the Ronald Sultana Memorial Lecture and for inviting me to deliver the inaugural address. It is a profound honour, and I am deeply moved to give this lecture. I will get to the content shortly, but since this lecture is a tribute to Ronald, I feel I need to share first some reflections about him: reflections on what Ron was to me—both as a scholar and a friend. In fact, one of the key lessons I learned from Ronald is that the personal and political are inseparable. Talking about him as a person is, therefore, also a way to understand the scholar and his work. A good example of this is one of his final books, Educators in the Mediterranean… Up Close and Personal, to which I had the privilege of contributing with a chapter. A book full of biographies that become tools to understand the author and his or her context. [excerpt]