On Said’s Representations of the Intellectual

It would be easy to criticize the vast generalizations of Edward W. Said’s book Representations of the Intellectual, because this work is both abstract and incomplete. It would also be easy to become entangled in the many hypocritical, shortsighted and self-justifying messages of this book. However, the act of connecting with, engaging in, and attempting to apply the many constructive ideas within this book to one’s own future life presents a challenge – not because these constructive ideas are sparse, but because the act of writing about our future situations can easily become plagued by tremendous generalizations and assumptions. These are the types of powerful, partisan generalizations and assumptions that this book may attempt to extinguish. Indeed, it is easy to work from within our established homes of reason (Said 17-18): to some degree, we are all the product of our environment (Said 26-27), and every person’s actions, statements or silence have the ability to affect other people in ways that may be difficult or impossible to contemplate.

From a relativistic perspective, what may be good for some is often bad for others, and the act of applying this book’s ideas to our future lives can only be accomplished by having a complete lack of respect for the future and its significant situations. To write about the future from within the confinement of “today” is, in some respects, to work blindly and at a tremendous altitude (Macdonald 522-523) from the future. Furthermore, no person can possibly claim complete exemption from contradictions with their moral veracity, especially in situations that advance the greater good. Therefore, I have nonetheless chosen to apply this book to a consideration of my future, because such an exercise provides a challenging context for reflection and deliberation; it also provides a lens through which I can explore this book’s ideas from the perspectives of ethics, communication and media. This exercise shall be considered a quest for tools and knowledge that will hopefully inspire responsible decisions and will guide me – and others – toward the necessary knowledge and thinking for a brighter future.

This exercise requires a general exploration of at least some of my personally-held principles – principles that are sometimes good for some and bad for others, and which are never without fault or question, because I am not at home in a static world of fixed judgment (Said 57-58): the principles are never without interpretation or context. My principles are closely aligned with the protection of people’s rights or freedoms as they are defined in the American Bill of Rights, and they extend to all people regardless of race, creed, gender, citizenship or religious belief – including the protection of peoples’ rights to a representative democracy, because a bill of rights1 cannot prosper without representative democracy. Said may agree with these goals when he says “the purpose of the intellectual is to advance human freedoms and knowledge” (17-18).

Believing that a person should have a position on every issue is dangerous, because no person has the capacity to do so responsibly. Therefore, people’s battles must be chosen, people must attempt to find a critical distance from the issues at hand, they must listen carefully to other’s arguments, and they must strive for accurate information (Said 20-21) to determine their positions: beyond the critical distance necessary for productive contemplation, people in a democracy cannot completely free themselves from the responsibility of participation when even the choice to remain neutral (or silent) is support for an outcome. It has always been my belief that adopting a passive position on any issue is an act of supporting the most powerful argument. Democracy cannot function properly without rhetoric, debate and participation within the governed.

People must not live in fear of “speaking truth to power” (Said 96-97, 102). If people find themselves in opposition to power – particularly in situations that may advance the equal distribution of rights and freedoms – the great challenge for the communicator should be to determine how to communicate the position in everyone’s best interest. While there may be plenty to fear and lose, this practice is crucial. Nonetheless, any person faced with this situation should find comfort that they are playing a vital role in a constructive process. The “act of speaking truth to power” can only be in everyone’s best interest, because making any exceptions to the lawful freedoms granted to any individual – in any degree – is a slippery slope that can only end in damage to everyone; it also has the power to protect everyone’s rights and freedoms from tyranny. As Said states, “the intellectual is an individual endowed with a faculty for representing, embodying, articulating a message, a view, an attitude, philosophy or opinion to, as well for, a public” (11-13). This presents a tremendous responsibility to communicators – one that becomes greater when we understand the value of the communicator’s ability to unlock and expose subtle and seemingly innocent prejudice, generalization, ideology (Said xi, xii, 20-21), rhetoric and propaganda in our mass media messages today.

Some people may question my personal, guiding principles, and ask why they do not include the moral mandates or charters of religion. I am, after all, not agnostic, and religion does play a role in the interpretation of my principles. However, religion will hopefully never do so in a way that will restrict others’ ability to live freely within their belief systems, and in ways that do not restrict others’ freedoms – because to participate in the influential art of communication in ways that would result in lawful restriction or discrimination of these freedoms works against my principles, against any hope for equality, and against the foundations of the Bill of Rights. Therefore, the only way to avoid such conflict is to generate tremendous sensitivity and strive to maintain a critical distance.

When communicators have the ability to influence others and to influence the resolution of issues – and thus affect the lives of many – there must be a separation of church and state, because a single church cannot adequately represent the beliefs of diverse peoples. Communication, laws or policy should never be a tool used by the powerful to selectively restrict the rights or freedoms of others. While religion is culturally and socially important, it is the Bill of Rights that should evolve democratically and with active debate and interpretation, to protect everyone equally within its jurisdiction. Therefore, religion shall remain a contributor to the interpretation of my principles, but the protection of the Bill of Rights’ integrity shall play a dominant role, even if doing so means sacrificing my personal beliefs for the greater good.

Some may argue that my principles are based on making a home within blind patriotic nationalism (Said xiii). In this book, Said quotes Adorno as saying that “it is part of morality not to be at home in one’s home” (57-58). This is a very provocative thought, and after careful reflection I can only hope to play my role as an American patriot that has no blindness to truth; I can only strive to use the American Bill of Rights to guide my future actions to the best of my abilities. It would be difficult to “make your home” in a place like the Bill of Rights, because it is interpreted and amended, and it evolves. It is never without its problems, and adopting a passive position on its evolution is dangerous. No political party “owns” the Bill of Rights, and its sole purposes are advancing equality and protecting people’s rights and freedoms from government. Nonetheless, any participants in debates surrounding the Bill of Rights are fraught with challenges, including questions of freedom versus control, the individual versus the community, and local versus universal. However, my belief still stands, and the active process of applying these principles to my decisions and endowing all people with these rights equally will help promote human prosperity without restricting my critical perspective. Active support for such principles will have a positive impact on many future generations.

There are many problems with basing personal veracity on today’s mass media. As I have mentioned many times in the past2, the deregulation of American mass media industries has created a situation where there are literally thousands of information channels and venues, but a shrinking number of powerful hands that control the content therein. Our capitalist market’s natural tendency toward concentration furiously drives companies toward oligopoly domination (Bettig & Hall 16) while effectively destroying media diversity. This concentration has ultimately resulted in the birth of conglomerates that exhibit an alarming control over every idea and message published through all mass media channels today. Further indicative of this amalgamation tendency is the fact that, between 1982 and 2003, the number of news stations with news staff dropped from 98 percent to 67 percent, and half of the remaining staff members now work on a part-time basis (Hickley 26); indeed, fewer minds and bodies are required to cut-and-paste or regurgitate a single message than to create original, thought-provoking dialogue. The result is that while there may be many “channels” competing for the public’s attention today, the information from many of these “channels” has been cross-pollinated. It is this deregulation that is perhaps the largest identifiable threat to my principles and to equality and positive human progress, because media conglomerations have the ability to create versions of truth, and occlude truths necessary for political struggles (Said 20-21). In the process, they limit the advance of “human freedom and knowledge” (Said 17-18), hamper people’s ability to “speak truth to power” (Said 96-97) and threaten the representative democracy that is necessary for the prosperity and equal distribution of rights and freedoms. When my principles are applied to this problem, I can only agree to do everything possible to derail policy and public support aligned with such conglomeration and tyranny. Therefore, I will strive to create technologies to eliminate such hegemony and activate the diversity necessary for positive progress.

Applying the constructive ideas within this book, more specifically, to my future is very difficult. The act of creating technology and leading business is fraught with tremendous ethical dilemmas and responsibilities. As “organic intellectuals” (Said 4), technologists often create situations that are liberating to some while restrictive to others. To understand some of the issues that technologists like me must question, we can explore both the positive and the negative3 aspects of technology development.

New technology can easily displace the autonomy that is otherwise found in holistic pursuits (like artistic expression) with a central “hub” (i.e., a manager) that controls the production processes in an effort to maximize profits, yield quantifiable results and make mass production possible (Franklin 57, 80-81). By working to keep both workflow and people ordered, these technologies can yield political and social compliance (Franklin 10, 16-17, 25, 49-51). Technologies can also contribute to a reduction in social learning and community-building by limiting feedback and social interaction in work processes (Franklin 172). Technology can eliminate the need for human labor – and thus inflict great change on the unwilling – and technology can change the speed of our lives and create stereotypes, literacy problems and situations that foster less critical thinking and more inequality (Said 28-29, Warschauer 1). Furthermore, such practices often encourage hierarchical, authoritarian, competitive and exclusive work situations (Franklin 103). On the other hand, technology can promote positive change. It can free people from redundant chores and thus allow them to pursue more productive, enlightening and holistic activities. Technology can create new opportunities, save lives, battle stereotypes, reduce literacy problems and inspire thinking. It can promote or protect human freedoms and knowledge, and it can be used to protect equal distribution of rights and freedoms. Obviously, if a person wishes to apply the constructive ideas in Said’s book to the situation of technology development – especially in a way that works toward the goals and responsibilities of advancing human freedoms and knowledge – the task will be difficult and complex, but they are tasks I will not approach blindly.

I only partially believe in Said’s statement that “the recognition of rights and democratic freedoms is established as a norm for everyone, not individually for a select few. Admittedly, however, these are idealistic and often unrealized aims; and in a sense they are not as immediately relevant to my subject here as the intellectual’s individual performance…” (99-100). I agree that these ideas are often idealistic, and I also agree that they are often unrealized aims. I believe, however, that the intellectual’s individual performance is necessary for making these aims realized.

Finally, the style of Said’s book is annoying, abrasive, and illustrative of the conflict that lives within its author – it may even be the very conflict necessary for the pursuit of truth. His writing forces us to confront and reconcile our personal beliefs by creating sensitivity to the beliefs of others (Said 94). He demonstrates and evangelizes the necessity of “speaking truth to power” (Said 96-97), the problems that face organic intellectuals, the benefits of finding a “position of exile” as an attempt to maintain a critical distance (Said 63-64), the problems with blind loyalty to our established beliefs (Said 40), the importance of breaking down stereotypes, the value of truth, and how this truth is created. Most importantly, Said lights a path that leads us toward greater human freedom and knowledge, and for that he should ultimately be commended.

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Works Cited:

Bettig, Ronald V., and Jeanne Lynn Hall. Big Media, Big Money. Cultural Text and Political Economics. Lanham: U of Minnesota P. 2003.

Franklin, Ursula M. The Real World of Technology. Rev. ed. Toronto: Anansi, 2004.

Hickey, Neil. “Power Shift: As the FCC Prepares to Alter the Media Map, Battle Lines Are Drawn.” Columbia Journalism Review 41 (2003): 26+.

Macdonald, Anne-Marie. The Way the Crow Flies. Toronto: Vintage Canada, 2003.

Said, Edward W. Representations of the Intellectual. New York: Vintage Books, 1996.

Warschauer, Mark. “Reconceptualizing the Digital Divide.” First Monday Vol. 7 No. 7. July 2002.

Notes:

1. “bill of rights” is lowercase intentionally -- it is used universally as the idea of a bill of rights.

2-3. I have stated these arguments before in other writings.

Posted on January 31, 2005 01:27 PM | TrackBack