Alameda Times-Star Online Radical thinker Chomsky doesn't fail March 20, 2002
By William Brand STAFF WRITER BERKELEY THE UNITED STATES is hardly a country to declare a war on terrorism, renowned linguist and radical thinker Noam Chomsky told a rapt audience at the University of California's Boalt Hall School of Law Tuesday. Chomsky said his political world view is little changed since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on America. After all, to much of the undeveloped world, America is the terrorist, Chomsky said. American arms and dollars supply the Turks, who have committed atrocities against the Kurdish people, Chomsky said. Now Vice President Dick Cheney is visiting Turkey, trying to encourage the Turks to participate in an attack on Iraq, he charged. Huge numbers of Kurds live there, he said. Fifty years ago, Chomsky turned the world of linguistics on its ear with the scientific conjecture that human beings are born with an innate ability to learn language. Japanese, English, Urdu and Swahili are just nuances of the same skill, he said. Humans can speak and learn language, but animals cannot, he noted. His well-documented findings made him a giant in his field, a reputation he still holds. Some 40 years ago, he stood with a handful of others in Boston Common protesting America's entry into the Vietnam War. Bostonians were incensed at this display of anti-Americanism and police had to rescue the protesters from an angry mob. Since then, there have been two Chomskys: the scientific Chomsky, who has been a professor of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for 47 years, and the political Chomsky, who travels the world, supporting the oppressed and espousing causes so unpopular in post-Sept. 11 America. But he plays well in Berkeley. Chomsky, who is 73 and about to retire from MIT, will speak again on campus today as a guest of UC Berkeley's Graduate Council. Muslim Students Association Tuesday afternoon, he spent two hours answering questions at an event sponsored by the UC Berkeley Muslim Students Association and other groups. "We asked if he would speak and he said he would and here he is," said Basim Elkarra, Muslim students president. Students were mostly awe-struck. "This is quite different from what we hear on CNN," said senior Heidi Price. He brought up a lot of issues to think about, she said. "He's not into rhetoric," said freshman Arezo Yazd. "You don't have to agree with him on every point. He's not a politician. But his main idea is to open your mind and question things." Palestinian and other Middle Eastern groups strongly support Chomsky because he strongly supports their cause. Although he was born in Philadelphia of Jewish refugee parents, he has long been outspoken against the state of Israel. On Tuesday, he scoffed at the U.S.-sponsored resolution in the United Nations calling for a separate Palestinian state within the boundaries of modern Israel. Ethnic homelands He compared the idea to the ethnic homelands for black Africans created by white South Africa at the peak of apartheid. But all wasn't dark and dour with the modern Chomsky. The United States isn't the dark empire, he said. All nations in power commit atrocities, he said, citing Britain during its colonial period as an example. The United States has changed in the last 20 years and mostly it is better today, he said. But forget about politics, he said. Instead, he believes positive changes have come about through large, popular movements, such as the civil and human rights movements and environmental action.
