The Engaged Intellectual: A Figure Facing Extinction?

Abstract

Since the Dreyfus Affair, we have seen the emergence of a figure that Zola summoned to the public scene: the intellectual, whose speech and action are rooted in the affirmation of their autonomy and in their two fundamental characteristics: the defense of universal causes, namely those separate from personal interests, and the transgression of the dominant order. Therefore, by definition, the intellectual is always someone socially and politically engaged. Today, intellectuals seem to be publically invisible and silent. Is the engaged intellectual a figure facing extinction? Keywords