Counter-culture
A particularly dynamic period in US history occurred in the 60s. It has been labelled the counter-culture. As the name implies this was a movement that went against the grain of mainstream American culture. It involved the struggle for racial equality, women’s rights, criticism of the Vietnam War and a rejection of received social norms – as in the case of the so-called hippie movement.
Famous people
Some people made their way into the history books due to their political involvement during this time. We have all heard of Martin Luther King. And some of you might also be familiar with names like Malcolm X and Noam Chomsky.
I guess that most of you have talked about MLK before so I won’t mention him in particular, although he is otherwise of significant interest and importance. I do however think that it could prove interesting to talk about Malcolm X and Noam Chomsky since their work and points of view are quite radical and thought-provoking.
Malcolm X was involved in the struggle for the civil rights of the black community in the US. He was, however, much more radical and some might say aggressive than his colleague Dr King. He is one time quoted as saying: “history proves the white man is a devil”… “Anybody who rapes, and plunders, and enslaves, and steals, and drops hell bombs on people… anybody who does these things is nothing but a devil”. Among other things he also argued that the Christian faith was the faith of the white man and as a consequence he converted to Islam.
Noam Chomsky is an important scientist in the field of linguistics and cognition. He has apart from his work on language involved himself strongly in issues relating to American foreign policy. He was a strong critic of the Vietnam War and has written several books about the atrocities of that conflict, particularly focussing on the responsibility carried by the US government for civilian casualties and alleged war crimes.
Chomsky is still alive and he is the most cited living scientist in the world. He still stirs up controversy and he debates issuse like the Obama election, the conflict in Israel and Palestine, and the war in Iraq.
There is quite a lot of lectures by and interviews with Prof. Chomsky on youtube.com. The following is an example of his criticism of the US.
Assignment
Discuss your impression of the two gentlemen described in this post. Please post a thought or a comment!
Second hour
We are going to look at this material on grammar.
January 19th, 2009 at 22:45
Wow! These both guys are fighting for something very hard and at the same time criticizing them in a really harsh way or maybe is it reality? The words of Malcolm in truth touched me extraordinarily much, using those strong words like “negro” but still in a good way, it made sense. I know his plan was to use those strong sentences to make people realize the problem that he talked about, but he did it in a literally good way. But afterwards as we sad in the classroom about that maybe this word wasn’t as strong as it meant. It was maybe a normal word that you could have for everyday use, like “table” or something.
Malcolm X was talking about “the field negros and the house negros”. What he said about the house negros was that they did the white man’s job. So in my opinion they could more or less work against their own population. Don’t they feel ashamed to work like that? Ok, I understand them; they got food, proper clothes and stuff. But still I would think hundred times before I took the job. I personally would never work against my race. The black community had it really rough during that time, together they could have done something big, change the world. When some of them work for the white race, they couldn’t.
Noam Chomsky can’t be popular in the U.S. To say that U.S I corrupted you have to have big guts. That the government steer it all, the elections and decided stuff without peoples knowledge etcetera. But I like his criticism, I’ve thought about it for a long time, watching documentaries at TV and reading different papers. I don’t know if it’s just propaganda but it made sense in my brain, I also think that US is corrupted in some areas. Especially in the 9/11 problem. It’s too much to explain, but ill send you a link (video). Check it out when you have time or maybe we could see it in class? (http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=Loose+change&emb=0#) really interesting material.
They both have something in common – A strong will. Malcolm was forced to sacrifice his life because of his thoughts. Who knows maybe since govern is corrupted they’ll kill Prof. Chomsky? We need more of these kinds of people, people who are ready to fight for their right and bring up some truths.
January 19th, 2009 at 23:24
I am certainly pleased whit you’re choice of topics so far, first the environment and then the American democracy debate. To me Malcolm X is a bit to radical for me to like him also he has this way were I feel he downgrades his way of speaking and language to reach the public better. While this might prove to be effective of reaching more people I don’t like it. I can’t really put my finger on it, it has got something to do whit some of the metaphors he uses. He doesn’t say things outright like say Chomsky would do. Not only do I like Chomsky’s message, but also he doesn’t care if everyone understands the terms and expressions he uses. His opinion on the US comes very close to my personal thoughts I have never seen it as a democracy since the voting is indirect (full of middle hands such as electors), yet a lot of Americans seem to think they live in a democracy. Also his way of speaking (tone and articulation) the upper class American has always had a special place in my heart I love the way it’s spoken. If I had to choose how I would personally speak American it would be somewhat alike him. The absolutely best would be like one of the representatives from United Refugee’s as shown in this clip (http://www.sr.se/sida/gruppsida.aspx?ProgramId=3286&grupp=5944 the Mads Mikkelsen entitled video, 1.03-1.38 2.40-4.34) I don’t know how I came across this specific clip but it’s remotely interesting, and his American is great.
January 21st, 2009 at 12:04
Just as Ferhat pointed both Malcolm X and Prof. Chomsky are fighting for something hard and meantime criticizing them in a really harsh way. It’s obviously not an easy effort what these men are coming up with, but I believe that if it’s not these kind of speakers who else will convey the society about the reality?
These men have two different attributes of how to convey their message….
As Mr.T pointed, Malcolm X downgrades his way of speaking and language to reach the public better. During his speech he uses harsh words like, negros, which we are not used to in the media today. But regardless of his strong language, he still got the black people on his side, he convinces them to realize that there are two different kind of black people, the house negroes and the field negroes. And to mention his way of describing the two types, he’s being as upright as you could be and some people might get that offending. I believe that he downgrades his speaking to reach the public better, because he wants them to really realize where they stand, how they are being treaded. He says that he’s a field negeroe and obviously he’s not ashamed of it. He is convincing them to not be ashamed of their race and that they shouldn’t be underestimated.
Prof. Chomsky is very sincere and knows exactly what he’s talking about. Like Mr.T said Chomsky doesn’t care if everyone understands the terms and expressions he uses, in contrast to Malcolm X who uses metaphors just to make sure the people understand. He’s speaking in a well-advised tone just the opposite to Malcolm X.
Chomsky is a vise man who’s being frank about how the American government are hiding some topics, for example during the elections. His opinion on the US is that he sees it as a polyarchy and not a democracy which the majority seem to do. He speaks about the governments outrages and how come US is a polyarchy and to me it does make a sense in what his arguments stands for.
January 22nd, 2009 at 23:08
The way of Malcolm X seems to be rough and straight to the point, using a more common and strong”language” Malcolm does not avoid rough words like, Negros. As Nathalie pointed out” Malcolm X downgrades his way of speaking and language to reach the public better.” That seems to be a very effective way to highlight a message, using words that the common man/woman are used to use and they understand the meaning behind the words.
Malcolm agitated his massages, strong and powerful with lots of references to history. The opposite of Malcolm X is Prof. Chomsky. A very intellectual person who uses a much more advanced language, with many different and sometimes difficult expressions, but he doesn’t care to explain them. Maybe it’s because he talks to an audience of higher intellectual standard and doesn’t need to explain every expression. Prof. Chomsky is using a more elegant way of describing his dissatisfaction with the American administration, like the election process. Chomsky also has an opinion on the democracy, America is not a democracy it’s a polyarchy.
Rough and hard or soothe and elegant, Malcolm X and Prof. Chomsky are describing problems in the US. They are rather different in their way of doing it, but you can’t help listening and reflect on it. Personally I like the discussion both about the segregation and the administration in US, so this was very interesting.