Noam Chomsky

[ComradeJunichi]

Is he a good writer? I'm about to start 9-11, I was wondering if you guys knew any other good books...What does he write about...like whats his perspective on things?

[Felicia]

It's funny that you ask about this guy, I just recently found out about him, I don't know a lot about what he writes, but he's into left politics and anarchism. :)

[j]

Well, you've come to the right place. I too just read 9-11. It was a great experience.

Chomsky has been heralded as one of the most important intellectuals of our time.

Manufacturing Consent is probably his most important and famous book. But he has written many, many books. I was introduced to him when I attended college and took a class on Mass Communication. My professor was a hard-core leftist and praised Chomsky in many, many classes.

Besides various interviews and such I have never read a full Chomsky book (9-11 is really just a big interview)with the exception of his theories on linguistics which are as radical as his political theories appear to the mainstream.

j

[samaniego]

Chomsky is by far a great man not for his works alone but for the humility he shows. He gives praise and honor who make his books speaches and protest possible. Chomsky has a large library of books but as a new comer to his work I strongly recommend the chomsky reader as well a his video or dvd manufacturing consent, the video is a quick intro to his ides as is the reader. Noam is a linguist as well as a promenent professor at M.I.T. He knows his stuff and always tells you not to just believe him but to look it up for yourself. He's a good guy.

[abstractmentality]

On the back of Understanding Power:
"Chomsky ranks with Marx, Shakespeare, and the Bible as one of the ten most quoted sources in the humanities." - The Guardian

I have only read excerpts from What Uncle Sam Really Wants, and im almost done with Understanding Power: the indispensible chomsky. the latter is 400 pages of question and answer sessions that he has had over the years, and i have found it to be a great read, as it goes through a lot of historical information, media stuff, political thought, etc., and i havent even finished yet.

[Napalm Dust]

I have just finished reading "Turning The Tide" by Chomsky. It tells in detail the US' intervention is Central America.
There's so much we don't know. You must read this book!

[Nic8]

If I understand him correctly, the main part of Chomskys theory is that the mass media has the power to make people thimk a certain way and is a tool used by the capitalists to brainwash society. "Propaganda is to the democracy what force is to the dictator."

For example:
I do not know if any of you have heard about what happened to the editor of the Ottawa Citizen. Most of the Canadian Media is owned by Canwest Global. The owners of the company are very pro-Liberal (the party in power that has developed into a benevolant dictatorship) and pro-Israel. The editor of the Ottawa Citizen printed an anti-Chretien (the dictator of Canada...uh...I mean Prime Minister of Canada) editorial. The editor was fired. The owners of Southam have put rules on all of their newspapers, more then half of the papers in Canada (I think), such as forcing them to print editorials from the Southam owners.

[evil chris]

if you want to start on Chomsky, my tips would be read the latter stuff.Hetends to write about the same stuff and just update it.And read his books that are interviews, they're much easyer going.
Rouge States is corkin though.