Who Is An Intellectual And What Should The Role Of Intellectuals Be In Society

Author : Christiane Landsiedel
Publisher : GRIN Verlag
Page : 8 pages
File Size : 49,8 Mb
Release : 2004-10-03
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9783638311052

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Who is an Intellectual and what should the Role of Intellectuals be in Society? by Christiane Landsiedel Pdf

Seminar paper from the year 2004 in the subject Sociology - Political Sociology, Majorities, Minorities, grade: A, University of Dalarna (European Political Sociology), course: The Role of Intellectuals, 13 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: Attempting to define who is an intellectual brings up the general impossibility to give a “correct” definition. As the formulation of a definition depends on the context, the thematic field, there is no universally valid definition, no objective “prototype” of an intellectual can be stated. Examining intellectuals in the context of totalitarian, post-totalitarian and democratic societies, I will analyse their outstanding role within these three regime types. Asking ‘what should the role of intellectuals be in society?’, this question enters the normative field. In the course of the programme we have come across several scientific approaches which define intellectuals differently, each based on a respective focus. According to the humanist point of view everyone is an intellectual – although he/she may not have the function of an intellectual. The intelligentia approach emphasizes the role of education whereas a Marxian definition focuses on the relation to the means of production: the intellec-tuals produce culture and therefore are opposed to the production of goods. In view of this variety my approach is based on Max Weber’s notion of the ideal type: functioning as a model, the definition comprises several realization forms; however, possible deviations from the ideal type do not result in the point that the ideal type is wrongly or in-adequately defined because the it does not lay claim to be an authentic picture of reality, rather it is an abstract model comprised of exaggerated features.

Author : Rajendra Pandey
Publisher : Mittal Publications
Page : 326 pages
File Size : 47,6 Mb
Release : 1990
Category : Educational sociology
ISBN : 8170992451

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The Role of Intellectuals in Contemporary Society by Rajendra Pandey Pdf

Author : Stefan Lochner
Publisher : GRIN Verlag
Page : 12 pages
File Size : 49,7 Mb
Release : 2011-10-21
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9783656033929

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Who is an intellectual What should the role of intellectuals be in society? by Stefan Lochner Pdf

Essay from the year 2004 in the subject Sociology - Politics, Majorities, Minorities, grade: G, Credits 6, University of Dalarna, language: English, abstract: It is very difficult to give a proper and precise definition of the social group or milieu of intellectuals because of its heterogenity and non-unity. Which should be the criteria and structure similarities that determine the definition? Is it possible to summarize all categories and types within a definition? Many perspectives exist concerning what an intellectual is and of course what his role or function in the society already is or should be, they all depend on different contexts or thematic fields and deviating focuses. Based on this variety I would define the explanandum according to the concept of the Weberian ideal type. In this case we should find universal categories which could stand for every object we can call “intellectual” in every time and every place, without moral, ethic or functional intentions. To my opinion intellectuals are a minority who have – due to their public/private education or natural talent – an above average expert knowledge or mind and consequently further reaching and profound realizations or specific ideas which are used to produce cultural goods in the broadest way of the word’s meaning. This includes for example scientists, authors, journalists, artists, composers, musicians, directors, priests and so on. So we have only three characteristic categories, by the may this makes them in comparison to other social groups – only in a quantitative point of view – a minority: An above average expert knowledge or mind, because of these realizations or ideas of a higher order which are finally transformed and materialized in speech, books, music, films, paintings or sculptures. Let us shortly closer light up these categories, for example in the social system of art, especially the modern art, as one subsystem of the cultural system. Some of the cultural products and with it the specific ideas, realizations and intentions have reached a point that they are for the average citizens, very difficult to understand or to interpret because of a lack of knowledge and mind in this special field. The cultural goods of the subsystem art as the so far final products of development and differentiation can therefore only in the first line really be understood by intellectuals with their special knowledge within this system that is separated from the outside.

Author : Thomas Sowell
Publisher : Basic Books
Page : 600 pages
File Size : 47,5 Mb
Release : 2012-03-06
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9780465031108

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Intellectuals and Society by Thomas Sowell Pdf

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 government leaders with disdain or contempt for intellectuals have had to bend to the climate of opinion shaped by those intellectuals. Intellectuals and Society not only examines the track record of intellectuals in the things they have advocated but also analyzes the incentives and constraints under which their views and visions have emerged. One of the most surprising aspects of this study is how often intellectuals have been proved not only wrong, but grossly and disastrously wrong in their prescriptions for the ills of society -- and how little their views have changed in response to empirical evidence of the disasters entailed by those views.

Author : Mary P. Corcoran,Kevin Lalor
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 54,6 Mb
Release : 2012
Category : Crisis management
ISBN : 1908996064

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Reflections on Crisis by Mary P. Corcoran,Kevin Lalor Pdf

This pocket-sized book brings together academic essays originally delivered at a Royal Irish Academy symposium held in 2008. This was the year the global financial crisis hit. This book reflects a bewilderment at the heart of Irish society as the public looked to journalists and academics for explanations and solutions to what went wrong. Broken into five essays by economists, social scientists and historians, the short volume teases out questions such as: can we think our way out of a crisis? At a time of economic collapse, do intellectuals have something to offer? Are the views of economists, novelists, playwrights, sociologists, historians, political scientists and civil servants dismissed and ignored? Is Irish society anti-intellectual? The emergence of the figure of the public intellectual in American society is considered in some detail, as the book makes a case for shared critical thinking, imagination and ideas as a basis for recovery.

Author : Noam Chomsky
Publisher : The New Press
Page : 112 pages
File Size : 53,5 Mb
Release : 2017-11-07
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9781620973646

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The Responsibility of Intellectuals by Noam Chomsky Pdf

Selected by Newsweek as one of “14 nonfiction books you’ll want to read this fall” Fifty years after it first appeared, one of Noam Chomsky’s greatest essays will be published for the first time as a timely stand-alone book, with a new preface by the author As a nineteen-year-old undergraduate in 1947, Noam Chomsky was deeply affected by articles about the responsibility of intellectuals written by Dwight Macdonald, an editor of Partisan Review and then of Politics. Twenty years later, as the Vietnam War was escalating, Chomsky turned to the question himself, noting that "intellectuals are in a position to expose the lies of governments" and to analyze their "often hidden intentions." Originally published in the New York Review of Books, Chomsky's essay eviscerated the "hypocritical moralism of the past" (such as when Woodrow Wilson set out to teach Latin Americans "the art of good government") and exposed the shameful policies in Vietnam and the role of intellectuals in justifying it. Also included in this volume is the brilliant "The Responsibility of Intellectuals Redux," written on the tenth anniversary of 9/11, which makes the case for using privilege to challenge the state. As relevant now as it was in 1967, The Responsibility of Intellectuals reminds us that "privilege yields opportunity and opportunity confers responsibilities." All of us have choices, even in desperate times.

Author : Thomas Sowell
Publisher : ReadHowYouWant.com
Page : 670 pages
File Size : 52,5 Mb
Release : 2010-03
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781458769572

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Intellectuals and Society by Thomas Sowell Pdf

Sowell unravels the world of intellectuals in order to illustrate an important social phenomenon: how the thinkers of a society mold that society, leaving an impact on people in every walk of life, even if these thinkers are basically unknown to the world at large.

Author : Christian Fleck
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 324 pages
File Size : 52,7 Mb
Release : 2016-05-23
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781317114871

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Intellectuals and their Publics by Christian Fleck Pdf

How do intellectuals engage with and affect their publics? What is the role of the public intellectual in the new age of political uncertainties? What challenges face female intellectuals and those speaking from an ethnic, national or class position? This exciting collection responds to these questions by offering a broad-ranging account of the changing role of intellectuals in public life. The volume opens with provocative essays on the idea and role of the public intellectual from Alexander, Evans and Zulaika. Chapters from Rabinbach on intellectuals' responses to totalitarianism, Outhwaite on what it means to be a European intellectual, and Auer’s discussion of the dissident intellectual in the collapse of communism lead onto vigorous debate of earlier points discussed through specific intellectual case studies from Tocqueville to Hayek. Intellectuals and their Publics will attract a broad readership interested in the role of the intellectual, with particular appeal for sociologists, political theorists and historians of ideas.

Author : Paolo Euron
Publisher : BRILL
Page : 251 pages
File Size : 45,5 Mb
Release : 2019-08-12
Category : Education
ISBN : 9789004409231

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Aesthetics, Theory and Interpretation of the Literary Work by Paolo Euron Pdf

This book introduces the reader to the literary work and to an understanding of its cultural background and its specific features, presenting basic topics and ideas in their historical context and development in Western culture.

Author : Anonim
Publisher : BRILL
Page : 334 pages
File Size : 53,9 Mb
Release : 2017-11-06
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9789004319523

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Considering Class: Theory, Culture and the Media in the 21st Century by Anonim Pdf

Considering Class offers international, interdisciplinary perspectives on class analysis today. It explores the gap between the class forces shaping the world and the paucity of class-consciousness at a popular level. The book shows the importance of the cultural struggle.

Author : Thomas Sowell
Publisher : Basic Books (AZ)
Page : 194 pages
File Size : 40,7 Mb
Release : 2013-03-12
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9780465058723

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Intellectuals and Race by Thomas Sowell Pdf

Intellectuals and Race is a radical book in the original sense of one that goes to the root of the problem. The role of intellectuals in racial strife is explored in an international context that puts the American experience in a wholly new light. The views of individual intellectuals have spanned the spectrum, but the views of intellectuals as a whole have tended to cluster. Indeed, these views have clustered at one end of the spectrum in the early twentieth century and then clustered at the opposite end of the spectrum in the late twentieth century. Moreover, these radically different views of race in these two eras were held by intellectuals whose views on other issues were very similar in both eras. Intellectuals and Race is not, however, a book about history, even though it has much historical evidence, as well as demographic, geographic, economic and statistical evidence-- all of it directed toward testing the underlying assumptions about race that have prevailed at times among intellectuals in general, and especially intellectuals at the highest levels. Nor is this simply a theoretical exercise. The impact of intellectuals' ideas and crusades on the larger society, both past and present, is the ultimate concern. These ideas and crusades have ranged widely from racial theories of intelligence to eugenics to "social justice" and multiculturalism. In addition to in-depth examinations of these and other issues, Intellectuals and Race explores the incentives, the visions and the rationales that drive intellectuals at the highest levels to conclusions that have often turned out to be counterproductive and even disastrous, not only for particular racial or ethnic groups, but for societies as a whole.

Author : Friedrich a Hayek,Friedrich von Hayek
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 24 pages
File Size : 53,9 Mb
Release : 2013-10
Category : Electronic
ISBN : 1258977923

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The Intellectuals and Socialism by Friedrich a Hayek,Friedrich von Hayek Pdf

This is a new release of the original 1949 edition.

Author : Ron Eyerman
Publisher : Polity
Page : 220 pages
File Size : 52,5 Mb
Release : 1994-06-14
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 074560904X

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Between Culture and Politics by Ron Eyerman Pdf

In this book Ron Eyerman examines the role of intellectuals in the new modern order, considering the impact of recent social changes on the nature of contemporary intellectual culture.

Author : Sebastian Veg
Publisher : Columbia University Press
Page : 386 pages
File Size : 50,7 Mb
Release : 2019-04-23
Category : History
ISBN : 9780231549400

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Minjian by Sebastian Veg Pdf

Who are the new Chinese intellectuals? In the wake of the crackdown on the 1989 democracy movement and the rapid marketization of the 1990s, a novel type of grassroots intellectual emerged. Instead of harking back to the traditional role of the literati or pronouncing on democracy and modernity like 1980s public intellectuals, they derive legitimacy from their work with the vulnerable and the marginalized, often proclaiming their independence with a heavy dose of anti-elitist rhetoric. They are proudly minjian—unofficial, unaffiliated, and among the people. In this book, Sebastian Veg explores the rise of minjian intellectuals and how they have profoundly transformed China’s public culture. An intellectual history of contemporary China, Minjian documents how, amid deep structural shifts, grassroots thinker-activists began to work outside academia or policy institutions in an embryonic public sphere. Veg explores the work of amateur historians who question official accounts, independent documentarians who let ordinary people speak for themselves, and grassroots lawyers and NGO workers who spread practical knowledge. Their interventions are specific rather than universal, with a focus on concrete problems among disenfranchised populations such as victims of Maoism, migrant workers and others without residence permits, and petitioners. Drawing on careful analysis of public texts by grassroots intellectuals and the networks and publics among which they circulate, Minjian is a groundbreaking transdisciplinary exploration of crucial trends developing under the surface of contemporary Chinese society.

Author : Stanley Aronowitz
Publisher : Columbia University Press
Page : 427 pages
File Size : 55,7 Mb
Release : 2012-07-10
Category : History
ISBN : 9780231509503

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Taking It Big by Stanley Aronowitz Pdf

C. Wright Mills (1916–1962) was a pathbreaking intellectual who transformed the independent American Left in the 1940s and 1950s. Often challenging the established ideologies and approaches of fellow leftist thinkers, Mills was central to creating and developing the idea of the "public intellectual" in postwar America and laid the political foundations for the rise of the New Left in the 1960s. Written by Stanley Aronowitz, a leading sociologist and critic of American culture and politics, Taking It Big reconstructs this icon's formation and the new dimension of American political life that followed his work. Aronowitz revisits Mills's education and its role in shaping his outlook and intellectual restlessness. Mills defined himself as a maverick, and Aronowitz tests this claim (which has been challenged in recent years) against the work and thought of his contemporaries. Aronowitz describes Mills's growing circle of contacts among the New York Intellectuals and his efforts to reenergize the Left by encouraging a fundamentally new theoretical orientation centered on more ambitious critiques of U.S. society. Blurring the rigid boundaries among philosophy, history, and social theory and between traditional orthodoxies and the radical imagination, Mills became one of the most admired and controversial thinkers of his time and was instrumental in inspiring the student and antiwar movements of the 1960s. In this book, Aronowitz not only reclaims this critical thinker's reputation but also emphasizes his ongoing significance to debates on power in American democracy.