Scholar/activists and regimes of truth: Rethinking the divide between universities and the streets

Challenging the divide between political activism in the streets and in the University that is frequently made by US academics, this commentary links insights about regimes of truth to the concept of scholar/activism. Three different forms of scholar activism are delineated: (1) direct political engagement; (2) acting as a public intellectual; and (3) creating a critical scholarship that directly challenges the dominant theoretical frameworks, solipsisms, mystifications, and silences that underlie neoliberal regimes of truth. The article notes that opposition to methodological nationalism is key to a scholar/activism relevant to world-wide struggles against oppression. It highlights an emerging subaltern cosmopolitanism that draws on experiential histories of oppression to bring together simultaneous cultural rootedness and openness to common aspirations for social and economic justice. © 2011 by the American Anthropological Association.