The Identitary Landmarks. Intellectuals and Their Role in the Construction of the European Identity

The main hypothesis of this study is that in all history moments there is a need for stability and key figures. In order to respond to this need it is sometimes necessary to create false images, increasing the charismatic power of some figures and condemning to oblivion the intellectuals of that time. The intellectuals are seen as a sort of “place of memory”, landmarks of knowledge to whom we must return in difficult times, regardless of their type, i.e. a totalitarian regime or a period characterized by the lost of the traditional values in a globalization era. But we must fight also with the danger of manipulation of this kind of memory places, especially their image, and the creation of a new type of “idols of the market place” and “idols of the theatre”. When the right public image has the most important role in the definition of an intellectual and when this image is easily constructed and reconstructed, a new definition of the intellectual is necessary.