Modelled on Machiavelli's notorious tract on statecraft, The Prince, Steve Fuller?s book dissects what it means to be an intellectual. What distinguishes them from philosophers, scientists, politicians or entrepreneurs? Why are they happy to be insulted as long as they are not ignored? And who is the intellectual's favourite superhero? "I devoured this in one sitting ... It's packed with juicy nuggets of genuine intellectual nourishment on every page" Dylan Evans
Angie Sandhu examines the relation between intellectuals and society through political theory and a consideration of contemporary debates in both Britain and the US. She sets out a new argument that calls for intellectuals to address their own elite locations in society by challenging notions of intellectual difference and autonomy
In these six essays--delivered on the BBC as the prestigious Reith Lectures--Edward Said addresses the ways in which the intellectual can best serve society in the light of a heavily compromised media and of special interest groups who are protected at the cost of larger community concerns. Said suggests a recasting of the intellectual's vision to resist the lures of power, money, and specialization. In these pieces, Said eloquently illustrates his arguments by drawing on such writers as Antonio Gramsci, Jean-Paul Sartre, Regis Debray, Julien Benda, and Theodore Adorno, and by discussing current events and celebrated figures in the world of science and politics: Robert Oppenheimer, Henry Kissinger, Dan Quayle, Vietnam and the Gulf War. Said sees the modern intellectual as an editor, journalist, academic, or political adviser--in other words, a highly specialized professional--who has moved from a position of independence to an alliance with powerful corporate, institutional, or governmental organizations. He concludes that it is the exile-immigrant, the expatriate, and the amateur who must uphold the traditional role of the intellectual as the voice of integrity and courage, able to speak out against those in power.
The Durkheimians have traditionally been understood as positivist, secular thinkers, fully within the Enlightenment project of limitless reason and progress. In a radical revision of this view, this book persuasively argues that the core members of the Durkheimian circle (Durkheim himself, Marcel Mauss, Henri Hubert and Robert Hertz) are significantly more complicated than this. Through his extensive analysis of large volumes of correspondence as well as historical and macro-sociological mappings of the intellectual and social worlds in which the Durkheimian project emerged, the author shows the Durkheimian project to have constituted a quasi-religious quest in ways much deeper than most interpreters have thought. Their fascination, both personal and intellectual, with the sacred is the basis on which the author reconstructs some important components of modern French intellectual history, connecting Durkheimian thought to key representatives of French poststructuralism and postmodernism: Bataille, Foucault, Derrida, Baudrillard, and Deleuze
The influence of intellectuals is not only greater than in previous eras but also takes a very different form from that envisioned by those like Machiavelli and others who have wanted to directly influence rulers. It has not been by shaping the opinions or directing the actions of the holders of power that modern intellectuals have most influenced the course of events, but by shaping public opinion in ways that affect the actions of power holders in democratic societies, whether or not those power holders accept the general vision or the particular policies favored by intellectuals. Even gover
Cover -- TOC36;Contents -- List of Contributors -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- CH36;1 The Public Role of Writers and Intellectuals -- CH36;2 Pre45;modern Intellectual Biography -- CH36;3 Humanism44; Slavery44; and the Republic of Letters -- CH36;4 Hamlet the Intellectual -- CH36;5 Deaths of the Intellectual58; A Comparative Autopsy -- CH36;6 New Art44; Old Masters44; and Masked Passions -- CH36;7 Apathy and Accountability58; The Challenge of South Africa8217;s Truth and Reconciliation Commission to the Intellectual in the Modern World -- CH36;8 The Sweatshop Sublime -- CH36;9 8220;Every Fruit45;juice Drinker44; Nudist44; Sandal45;wearer 46; 46; 46;8221;58; Intellectuals as Other People -- IDX36;Index -- Last Page.
Sociologist Patricia Hill Collins has been called in Contemporary Sociology "one of the defining voices of contemporary feminist and race scholarship." Well known for her contributions to sociology, social theory, and cultural studies, her numerous publications indicate why she has been a tireless voice for social justice causes such as the dynamics of race, social class, gender, and sexual equality, and also black feminist politics. In On Intellectual Activism, Collins asks scholars and public intellectuals to assess the meaning of their work. She challenges readers to rethink the potential o
ABSTRACT. By imagining their audiences, intellectuals invented and constructed the collective identities of nations and transnational communities like Europe or humankind. Four ideal types of intellectuals are outlined by describing them in their relation to politics: the intellectual as cosmopolitan ascetic; the intellectual as enlightened legislator; the intellectual as revolutionary; and the intellectual as the voice of a traumatic memory. These ideal types change over time in response to their focus of attention and their mode of communication. Because of changes in their media (from handwritten to printed books) and changes in their written language (from Latin to French and Italian, and further to vernacular languages), intellectuals were able to change views on past, present and future times. Today, they are involved in (civic) resistance but rarely in politics per se. By renewing the tension of the sacred and profane – the so‐called axial‐age revolution – contemporary intellectuals in Eastern Europe are decoupled from direct political power.