Intellectuals divide into traditional and organic groups tied to class formations

Evidence

The notion of “the intellectuals” as a distinct social category independent of class is a myth. All men are potentially intellectuals in the sense of having an intellect and using it, but not all are intellectuals by social function. Intellectuals in the functional sense fall into two groups. In the first place there are the “traditional” professional intellectuals, literary, scientific and so on, whose position in the interstices of society has a certain inter-class aura about it but derives ultimately from past and present class relations and conceals an attachment to various historical class formations. Secondly, there are the “organic” intellectuals, the thinking and organising element of a particular fundamental social class. These organic intellectuals are distinguished less by their profession, which may be any job characteristic of their class, than by their function in directing the ideas and aspirations of the class to which they organically belong. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 245

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the core distinction between traditional and organic intellectuals that animates the whole essay.
• XREF: Directly connects forward to Gramsci’s ‘all men are philosophers’ and to how Islamophobia scholars later deploy organic intellectuals vs. traditional clergy/intelligentsia. — connects to: A ruling class lacking organic intellectuals cannot sustain hegemony — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1869; Every rising social group organically produces its own intellectuals to articulate its function — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 1176