Major milestones celebrated

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Major milestones celebrated 2017-03-27T13:41:57+00:00

To mark Vigdís’s 75h birthday in 2005, the Vigdís Finnbogadóttir Institute of Foreign Languages (VFI) collaborated with the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Education and Culture and the City of Reykjavík in hosting an international conference on 13-15 April under the title of Dialogue of Cultures. The conference brought together a range of eminent scholars from all parts of the world in the fields of literature, cultural studies, linguistics and computer sciences.

The same year, the Icelandic government organised an international meeting of women ministers of culture from around the world in Reykjavík on 29-30 August. The meeting was hosted in collaboration with the Council of Women World Leaders, of which Vigdís was one of the founder members and first chair, and was attended by women government ministers and specialists from all around the world.

To coincide with Vigdís’s 80th birthday on 15 April 2010 the VFI hosted an international academic conference at the University of Iceland on 15-17 April under the title Preserving the Future: Sustainability of Language, Culture and Nature. In addition, the Institute also collaborated with the rector of the University of Iceland, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Education and Culture, the City of Reykjavík and a number of other interested societies and organisations in staging a celebratory programme of events in the Háskólabíó cinema. The programme bore the title “You always sail to the same land…” and attracted a full house, as well as being broadcast on radio and television.

On 28 June 2015, to mark the 35th anniversary of Vigdís Finnbogadóttir’s election as president of Iceland, the VFI got together with the Icelandic parliament, the City of Reykjavík, the Icelandic Forestry Association, the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service and a large number of other institutions and organisations to stage a festival of events on Arnarhóll in the centre of Reykjavík. The programme featured a large and wide-ranging group of participants and was televised directly on RÚV.