Braj Ranjan Mani Knowledge and Power
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book for aspiring intellectuals
By Grant McFarland on December 19, 2013
Knowledge and Power review By the author's own words, this book is "intended to be accessible and useful for general readers" and he succeeds in this endeavor. Mani loses none of the fire and passion with which he wrote his previous work Debrahmanizing History, but this work is much more accessible to the lay reader and average American who knows very little about India's history, society and politics. Knowledge and Power spans the history of both India and the West to identify parallels in oppressive thinking produced by both cultures. It's first four chapters expose the way ancient elitist thought has shaped and molded the world in which we live today, while the fifth chapter seeks to explode those oppressive paradigms, providing for means through which the shackles of mental slavery can be loosed and the full potential of the human mind can be harnessed. The overwhelming desire of the book is to see a new breed of intellectual, one free from the elitist, oppressive thought that has embedded itself so well in today's power structures of media, politics, and academics. This book succeeds in exposing the traps and temptations that knowledge brings as aspiring intellectuals begin their careers. If you are an American and are looking for an excellent, accessible elucidation of the cultural and counter cultural trends of India, Knowledge and Power is for you. If you consider yourself a freedom fighter, someone seeking to understand the world in an effort to change it for the better, Knowledge and Power is for you. Among the most popular of Mani's targets for criticism are Brahmanic Hinduism, capitalism, the caste system, loosely moralized feminist movements that glorify sexuality through promiscuity, social Darwinism, infosmut and entertainment glut, and patriarchy. Mani loves to expose the injustices of the dominate cultural paradigm, but he's quick to point out the flaws in some of the popular counter cultural movements throughout the world. He doesn't seek to critique everything so that there's nothing of value left, but to expose the way elites can lead both cultural and counter cultural movements to allow for the truly oppressed to create the third option. He wants to lay the foundation to a world of common man intellectuals to replace the intellectual prostitutes that this world has suffered for millennia. A considerable effort has been made towards this end with the addition of his Resources for Transformation. Hundreds of millions of books have been written in this world, most by these intellectual prostitutes which glorify their predecessor prostitutes, and it would be easy to get lost in their smut. Mani has included a categorized recommended reading list to point people to the real sources of subversive thought that builds an egalitarian world. Mani is well read, and it shows in this book. He brings both competing and cooperative thoughts from scholars all over the world together to illustrate his points, and he does it well. One great, if not unintended, resource this book provides is a collection of quotes from freedom fighting intellectuals such as Mani himself. Knowledge and Power is a highly enlightening and easily accessible read that introduces the reader to a world-wide range of thought in an effort to divorce the knowledge-power coalition that corrupts both realms and recreate the realm of knowledge with justice seeking, common man intellectuals leading the way.
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Braj Ranjan Mani Knowledge and Power
Source: https://www.amazon.com/Knowledge-Power-Braj-Ranjan-Mani/dp/9350980304
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