In these six essays--delivered on the BBC as the prestigious Reith Lectures--Said addresses the ways in which the intellectual can best serve society in the light of a heavily compromised media and of special interest groups who are protected at the cost of larger community concerns.Said suggest a recasting of the intellectual's vision to resist the lures of power, money, and specialization.In these pieces, Said eloquently illustrates his arguments by drawing on such writers as Antonio Gramsci, Jean-Paul Sartre, Regis Debray, Julien Benda, and Theodore Adorno, and by discussing current events and celebrated figures in the world of science and politics: Robert Oppenheimer, Henry Kissinger, Dan Quayle, Vietnam and the Gulf War.Said sees the modern intellectual as an editor, journalist, academic, or political adviser--in other words, a highly specialized professional--who has moved from a position of independence to an alliance with powerful corporate, institutional, or governmental organizations. He concludes that it is the exile-immigrant, the expatriate, and the amateur who must uphold the traditional role of the intellectual as the voice of integrity and courage, able to speak out against those in power."e;Bracing and heartfelt. A fiercely assertive description of the intellectual as an oppositional figure."e;--The New Yorker.