A Citation for Professor João Malaca Casteleiro

Delivered by Professor Maria Antónia Espadinha, Head of Department of Portuguese of Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities

It is both an honour and a great pleasure for me to participate in this ceremony and to read the academic citation for Professor João Malaca Casteleiro, on the occasion of the award of the Degree of Doctor of Letters, honoris causa, by the University of Macau.

Full Professor and Head of the Department of Portuguese Language and Culture in the Faculty of Arts of the University of Lisbon, Professor Malaca Casteleiro is a renowned scholar who has dedicated his life to research and the study of the Portuguese language. He is a member of many Portuguese and international associations and has made a distinguished contribution to various academic institutions, of which we mention only a few:

• His Membership of the Academia das Ciências de Lisboa (Lisbon Academy of Science) since 1979,
• His activities as a Scientific Counsellor of the Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica (National Institute for Research),
• The Chairmanship of the Academic Council of the Faculty of Arts of the University of Lisbon for several years,
• His Chairmanship of the Institute for Lexicology and Lexicography of the Portuguese Language, since 1991.

Besides his commitment to teaching, Professor Malaca Casteleiro has also dedicated most of his life to the study of his language that is also mine: the Portuguese language. The works that Professor Malaca Casteleiro has published are also books of reference for many of the scholars who are here today.

Professor Malaca Casteleiro has been and still is responsible for important and relevant research projects, such as:

• Português Fundamental;
• Estruturas Lexico-Gramaticais do Português Contemporâneo;
• Dicionario Electrónico do Português Contemporâneo.

In the field of his major projects and related publications, I would like to mention a particular work that was long anticipated and finally published in 2000: the Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa Contemporanea, generally known as the Dicionário da Academia, and also the Dicionário Escolar da Língua Portuguesa.

So far, I have only mentioned part of Professor Malaca Casteleiro's research contributions to the enhancement of the study of the Portuguese language. I have not yet mentioned the universities with which he has co-operated as an Invited or Visiting Professor. The University of Macau is one of these institutions: Professor Malaca's collaboration with the University of Macau began in 1987, when it was still the University of East Asia.

He has also supervised several dozens of Master's and Doctoral theses, both in Lisbon and in other universities.

The only reward for his hard work is the immense respect that he has earned from other scholars all over the world and from his students. He has been invited to address numerous conferences and seminars, to give lectures and to lead symposia. I suppose that Professor Malaca must have considered the esteemed award, in 1998, from the French government of the Ordem das Palmas Académicas especially gratifying. However, I believe that he was even happier and more proud on the occasion of the award by the President of the Portuguese Republic, in 1975, of the Grande Oficial da Ordem do Infante Dom Henrique, the highest declaration offered to academics and scholars in Portugal.

Honourable Chief Executive of the Macao SAR and Chancellor of the University;
Honourable Rector;
Distinguished Guests;
Dear Colleagues and Students;
Ladies and Gentlemen;

It was a wise decision of our Chancellor, Mr. Edmond Ho, to approve the proposal that was submitted to him by the University of Macau, the leading public institution of higher education in the Macau SAR, whose Honorary Degree Committee suggested the award of this distinction, the highest honorary degree that can be offered in the region, the Degree of Doctor of Letters, honoris causa, to Professor Malaca Casteleiro, whom I am very proud to present here today. I know that the University of Macau will now be proud to count amongst its own fellowship this prestigious academic, an unassuming scholar who offers the fruits of his vast achievement to the world's intellectual community and generously shares with others what he has learned and researched and, by so doing, his own great knowledge grows ever richer. Indeed, just as loving one's neighbour is something that becomes larger when it is divided, so too with knowledge there is no division, but only growth in sharing.

The University of Macau is itself to be congratulated because it can count as its own this illustrious academic who will contribute, as he always has, to the enhancement of the University of Macau in the international academic world and especially in the global Portuguese-language community.

Thank you, Professor Malaca Casteleiro.