Synopses & Reviews
The representation of the economic, political, cultural and, more importantly, global interrelations between agents involved in the process of intellectual activity is at the core of the inquiry in this volume that scrutinizes a distinct transformation occurring in the modalities of intellectual production also detectable in the changing role of academics themselves. In our transitional era, due to a worldwide political and economic crisis since 2008, world powers are slowly shifting into different positions of authority making the debate concerning intellectual contributions to public discourse timelier than ever. This is the second edited volume on the topic by Silvia Nagy-Zekmi and Karyn Hollis. In 2010 they co-edited Truth to Power: Public Intellectuals in and Out of Academe.
Review
"Contesting Richard Posner's neoliberal valorization of lawyers and politicians as the proper public intellectuals, and advancing Edward Said's advocacy of humanistic academics as providing society a dissenting voice in conflicts with authority, Nagy-Zekmi and Hollis offer a stimulating collection of essays defending them as producers of knowledge rather than as teaching professionals who merely transmit it. In suggesting that digital media and the internet offer avenues for a transnational conversation with academics that has a chance of circumventing corporate-owned media, contributors to this important discussion provide a timely forum on the vibrancy of scholarship as a refreshing, disturbing, and necessary voice in the public forum." -John C. Hawley, co-editor, The Postcolonial and the Global
Synopsis
Addresses the representation of the economic, political, and cultural interrelations between agents involved in the process of intellectual activity. Analyzes the transformation in intellectual production and the changing role of academics themselves.
Synopsis
Nagy-Zekmi and Hollis address the representation of the economic, political, and cultural interrelations between agents involved in the process of intellectual activity. They also analyze the transformation in intellectual production and the changing role of academics themselves, while reviewing the transition from an objectivist, historical standpoint to imaginative constructs based on cultural relativism. Examples of past and current attitudes of intellectuals are thus analyzed from a transnational perspective by focusing on the exchange of ideologies, the practices of state-power, democracy, and anti-democracy, up to the public deliberations surrounding such issues as the “war on terror.”
About the Author
Silvia Nagy-Zekmi is a professor of Hispanic and Cultural Studies and Director of the Cultural Studies Program at Villanova University. She has published widely on postcolonial and cultural studies. Her latest publications include:
Perennial Empires; and
Colonization or Globalization? Postcolonial Exploration of Imperial Expansion, both with Chantal Zabus;
Moros en la costa: Orientalismo en América Latina; and
Paradoxical Citizenship: Edward Said.
Karyn Hollis is Director of the Concentration in Writing and Rhetoric in the English Department at Villanova University. She has published Liberating Voices: Writing at the Bryn Mawr Summer School for Women Workers as well as articles on writing for community organizations, literacy campaigns in Latin America, and feminist pedagogy.
Table of Contents
PART I: Homo Academicus: Making the Case * From Rational to Relevant: What Counts as "Public" Knowledge? - J. Scott Andrews * From the Organic to the Accidental: Cultural Studies and the Proliferation of Contemporary Categories of the Academic as Public Intellectual - Handel K. Wright * Beyond the Specialist/Generalist Framework? Reflections on Three Decades of the Comparative History of Intellectual Discourse - Kjetil Ansgar Jakobsen * Homo Academicus, Quo Vadis? - Jan Servaes * The Enemy Within? Intellectuals and Violence in the "Postmodern Condition" - Matteo Stocchetti * Far Out! : The Existential Situation of the African-American Public Intellectual - Adebe DeRango-Adem * Language and Limitations: Toward a New Praxis of Public Intellectualism - Kathryn Comer and Timothy Jensen * PART II: Case Studies * Should Philosophers Become Public Intellectuals? - Sam Rickless * The Ethics of Public Intellectual Work - David Beard * Antonio Cornejo Polar and the Engagement of Intellectuals - ulises J. Zevallos-Aguilar * International Perspectives on Speaking Truth to Power - D. Ray Heisey * imagined Community Service: The Need for Queer Approaches to Service Learning - Amin Myers * Writing with an Accent - Lahcen Ezzaher