New World of Indigenous Resistance: Noam Chomsky and Voices from North, South, and Central America

Indigenous societies throughout Latin America are facing difficult choices. After centuries of colonization, the ongoing struggle to preserve communal knowledge, rituals, language, traditions, teaching and learning practices has taken on even more significance in the increasingly standardized world of globalization. For many indigenous societies, protecting community-based customs has involved the rejection of state-provided education, raising a series of interconnected issues regarding autonomy, modernity and cultural sustainability.

In New World of Indigenous Resistance, these questions are approached from multiple perspectives by means of an innovative exchange between linguist and human rights advocate Noam Chomsky, and more than twenty scholars, activists and educators from across the Americas.

Two interviews with Chomsky open the exchange with lessons from world history, linguistics, economics and anti-authoritarian philosophy, parallel histories of peoples worldwide who have resisted state power while attempting to sustain or even revitalize community traditions. In response to Chomsky's ideas, voices from Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Peru, the United States and Uruguay dray from their first-hand experience and scholarship, speaking to, with, and at times against Chomsky's views. In a final interview Chomsky reflects upon the commentaries; the result is a nuanced intellectual and political exchange—a compelling conversation that offers a contemporary vision of indigenous resistance, survival and hope.

"Two direct interviews with Chomsky enhance this articulate examination of challenges facing indigenous peoples today, including a positive viewpoint of means by which indigenous cultures can resist total assimilation, endure and spread hope. Highly recommended."—Midwest Book Review

"The key issue facing indigenous peoples as they gain new rights and raise their profile within Latin America's newly democratic states is how to reconcile the cultural inheritance that makes them indigenous with forces that aim to tether them to national identities or unleash upon them the corrosive acculturation implied by globalization. . . . This collection of commentaries – framed by the wisdom of Noam Chomsky—offers an excellent point of departure for the student interested in addressing such questions. With a significant focus on education, the writers address the thorny yet timeless issue of how to reconcile the ancient with the modern. . . . If there is one theme that emerges, it is of the potential for inter-communal co-operation and the concrete benefits diversity can bring to Latin American social life."—Gavin O'Toole, Latin American Review of Books

"This book is unique, thought-provoking and inspiring. The voices included in this edited collection, most of them unheard in mainstream Western academia, not only denounce the crimes committed against Indigenous peoples, but also reflect decades of Indigenous struggle, resistance, hope and commitment. . . . This book speaks to students, teachers, administrators and researchers from different disciplines and invites them to work together and follow the exemplary struggles of Indigenous peoples in different parts of America."—Teachers College Record

Noam Chomsky was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on December 7, 1928. He studied linguistics, mathematics and philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania. In 1955, he received his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania and began teaching at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he is Institute Professor Emeritus in the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy.

During the years 1951 to 1955, Chomsky was a Junior Fellow of the Harvard University Society of Fellows. While a Junior Fellow he completed his doctoral dissertation entitled, “Transformational Analysis.” The major theoretical viewpoints of the dissertation appeared in the monograph Syntactic Structure, which was published in 1957 and is widely credited with having revolutionized the field of modern linguistics. This formed part of a more extensive work, The Logical Structure of Linguistic Theory, circulated in mimeograph in 1955. Most of a 1956 version was published in 1975.

In 1961, Chomsky was appointed full professor in the Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics (now the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy) at MIT. From 1966 to 1976 he held the Ferrari P. Ward Professorship of Modern Languages and Linguistics. In 1976 he was appointed Institute Professor, a position he held until 2002.

Chomsky is the author of numerous influential political works, including Failed States (Metropolitan Books), Hegemony or Survival: America’s Quest for Global Dominance (Metropolitan Books), 9/11 (Open Media Series/ Seven Stories Press), Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media with Ed Herman (Pantheon), Necessary Illusions (South End Press), Understanding Power (New Press), Interventions (Open Media Series/ City Lights), Hopes and Prospects (Haymarket) and many other titles.

In 1988, Chomsky received the Kyoto Prize in Basic Science, given "to honor those who have contributed significantly to the scientific, cultural and spiritual development of mankind." The prize noted that "Dr. Chomsky’s theoretical system remains an outstanding monument of 20th century science and thought. He can certainly be said to be one of the great academicians and scientists of this century."