Democracy\u27s Promise and the Politics of Worldliness in the Age of Terror

In his article, Democracy\u27s Promise and the Politics of Worldliness in the Age of Terror, Henry A. Giroux draws attention to how the crisis in US-American democracy has been heralded and exacerbated by the nation\u27s increasing skepticism -- or even overt hostility -- toward the educational system. Part of such a challenge means that educators, artists, students, and others need to rethink and affirm the important presupposition that higher education is integral to fostering the imperatives of an inclusive democracy and that the crisis of higher education must be understood as part of the wider crisis of politics, power, and culture. In an effort to rescue the possibility of political engagement and to emphasize the civic role of academia, Giroux examines the work of two major public intellectuals: Jacques Derrida and Edward Said. Giroux then connects Derrida\u27s project of addressing the promise of democracy to Said\u27s notion of worldliness. Focusing on Said\u27s linkage of worldliness and wakefulness, Giroux argues that at the heart of opposing the new authoritarianism is making pedagogy and education central to the political tasks of reclaiming public space, rekindling the importance of public connectedness, and infusing civic life with the importance of a democratic worldly vision