Cornel West: As a Nation, We Have the Blues (2003)

Dandelion Salad

Image by Brennan Cavanaugh via Flickr

ThisBoyTV on Nov 7, 2011

Dr. West has written and co-authored numerous books on philosophy, race and sociology. His Race Matters won a Critics Choice Award and was listed as a New York Times Notable Book of the Year in 1992. Other works included Keeping the Faith: Philosophy and Race in American and Jews and Blacks: Let the Healing Begin, co-authored with Michael Lerner.

Patriot Authoritarian Act – Dr. Cornel West

***

www.democracynow.org

July 21, 2003

Today on Democracy Now! we spend the hour with Dr. Cornel West. Described as one of America’s most vital and eloquent public intellectuals, West is a critic of culture, an interpreter of African American experience, an advocate of social justice, and an analyst of post-modern art and philosophy.

West says, “I come from a tradition of struggle, of a particular peoples who have been on intimate terms with forms of death. American slavery–244 years–was a threat of social death… No legal status, no social standing, no public value. Only a commodity to be bought and sold.”

West was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1953. He earned a BA from Harvard University and an MA and PhD degrees from Princeton University.

West has written and co-authored numerous books on philosophy, race and sociology. His Race Matters won a Critics Choice Award and was listed as a New York Times Notable Book of the Year in 1992. Other works included Keeping the Faith: Philosophy and Race in American and Jews and Blacks: Let the Healing Begin, co-authored with Michael Lerner. In 1996 he co-authored The Future of Race with his Harvard colleague, Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

He has also produced a hip-hop CD entitled Sketches of My Culture and recently made a cameo appearance in the movie, Matrix Reloaded.

West spoke in Santa Fe, New Mexico on June 25th at an event sponsored by the Lannan Foundation.

In his speech, West gives his insight on the continual erosion of civil rights and liberties in America today, the darkness and brutality lurking in detention centers across the country, and a foreign policy guided by aggressive militarism:

“We can look at the Patriot Act I, the Patriot Act II, the escalating authoritarianism, the violation of rights and liberties of Arab brothers and sisters and Muslim brothers and sisters. We can look at the aggressive militarism: in Iraq today, Syria, Iran, North Korea. It’s very dark… [But] keep smiling, keep fighting, keep thinking keep loving, keep serving, keep sacrificing. It’s not about the win overnight, it’s not about the quick fix, it’s not about the push-button solution. It’s about what kind of human being you want to be, what kind of legacy you want to live.”

• Dr. Cornel West speaking at an event sponsored by the Lannan Foundation in Santa Fe, New Mexico on June 25th.

see

OWS: Chris Hedges, Rev. Billy and other protesters arrested at Goldman Sachs + Hedges’ statement: A return to the rule of law

The toppling of the corporate state by Chris Hedges

Cornel West and Dennis Trainer arrested at Supreme Court at Occupy DC/October2011 + Speech

Greg Palast, Cornel West, Bernie Sanders, Thom Hartmann, Tony Schultz, Jim Hightower and Dennis Kucinich at Fighting Bob Fest