Women Empowering Women Worldwide: Global Connections from Lampedusa, Italy
On March 20, 2025, a group of boundary-spanning women met in person and over Zoom to learn, listen, understand, and explore the possibilities of coming together across cultures, languages, and worldviews.
As women representing different fields and backgrounds, the time spent in person on the island of Lampedusa and in virtual community was only the beginning.
Thanks to Alessandra Von Burg, ACE Fellow, for acting as the translator for this event.
A Message from Allesandra Von Burg
Thank you for your gift of time and for your stories. The Zoom meeting was brief, a beginning and a possibility to plan for the future.
We are writing from Rome, with a piece of our heart in Lampedusa, and also in Winston-Salem, N.C., Catania, Milan, Johannesburg, Sondrio, Palermo, Pisa, Siena, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines, a nation of islands.
We are also islands, separated yet united, an archipelago that remembers the past together and looks forward to the future, moving slowly and quickly.
We promised notes, a brief biography of all the people who are part of this fantastic group, and an update on the next step: an exhibition by Rossella Sferlazzo in Venice, with the date to be decided in either the end of 2025 or the beginning of 2026.
Speaking of gathering, the three days in Lampedusa were fantastic, impossible to summarize those moments together at the historical archives, at the must-win, immersed in nature, on cliffs, at Porto M, at bar dell’Amicizia, al Gallo d’Oro, and in the magic space for/with the stories of Giglio Marino.