ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that public intellectuals must address combining the mutually interdependent roles of educators and citizens. It also argues that cultural studies has helped make visible three major issues that need to be further developed by educators and others in order to face the challenge of an increasingly conservative and reactionary political and social order, particularly in the United States. As the concept of the public is increasingly attacked by the various factions on the right, a mounting criticism has emerged over the purpose of higher education along with the role that educators might play as critically engaged public intellectuals. Politicizing education perpetuates pedagogical terrorism, while a political education expands the pedagogical conditions for students to understand how power works on them, through them, and for them in the service of constructing and deepening their roles as critical citizens.
