The oblivion of contemporary intellectuals.
Today, the intellectual is one of the most discussed figures both for the attitude he has taken towards society and for the denial of the past. It is evident that the strangeness of the past is caused by the social and technological changes that characterize contemporaneity, leading to a break with the past. Furthermore, the figure of the intellectual is today deprived of authority in the exercise of thought. In fact, the term "intellectualis" in philosophy indicates the intellect in its theoretical activity and, consequently, does not have the characteristic of privilege that it possessed in the past.
The contemporary intellectual lives a reality that leads him to separate from society and face issues such as politics, economics and the crisis of values. His role is to immerse himself in society with all of himself, weighing up the social, political and cultural balances, and not to support the ideology of the moment. "If you can feel pain, you are alive. If you can feel the pain of others, you are human" (Lev Tolstoy, "Critical Consciousness"). In this regard, Albert Asor Rosa asks himself whether we are faced with the denial of traditional forms of culture or the weakening of the figure of the intellectual.
The contemporary intellectual cannot take an uncritical attitude towards society but must try to grasp all its cultural aspects by criticizing them, in order to awaken the conscience of the people and restore the pride lost for a long time. Gramsci stated: "All men are intellectuals, but not all men have the function of intellectuals in society." Gramsci emphasizes that the intellectual "consists in actively mixing in practical life, as a builder, organizer, permanent persuader."
Today, the figure of the intellectual is in crisis, he lives in the sleep of oblivion, he has lost his organic relationship with society and, consequently, his identity. The contemporary intellectual is a "heterodox", as Maldonado states, one who acts in opposition to dogmas, models of behavior and power structures, a rebel and an opponent. Rebels not like the romantic intellectuals of the early twentieth century, who felt invested with a social mission aimed at conquering freedom and forming a unitary state. The intellectuals of the twentieth century revolved around magazines, trying to create a new unity between culture and art, between ideological theories and political practice, arguing with the academic intellectual separated from social and political life.
Certainly, today, the intellectuals of the twentieth century would create a conflict with contemporary intellectuals, detached from society, while the twentieth century saw in culture the possibility of social affirmation. In Paris, intellectuals lived in a culturally open and stimulating environment, from which revolutionary experiences were born such as the pictorial movement of Cubism, which radically changed the panorama of world culture. Montale also took a critical attitude towards consumerism, defining it as a new "barbarism" capable of modifying man's relationship with culture and art.
The contemporary intellectual does not question himself about the fate of freedom in a society controlled by the mass media which invites consumerism, giving rise to man's alienation and detachment from the values that were his points of reference. Today the intellectual should invite man to recover homo Sapiens and not homo Faber, using today's communication tools even in a provocative way. As Prevert states, "intellectuals should not be allowed to play with matches."
Anna Riggio