Between Populist Anti-intellectualism and Leftist Messianism: An Interview with Bruno Chaouat

In this interview, Bruno Chaouat discusses Donald Trump, anti-Americanism, the tradition of laïcité, the preoccupation with safe spaces in American higher education, the impact of French literary theory on the American academy, the reception of Critical Race Theory in France, French intellectual antisemitism, and other topics. He criticizes recent developments in French and American theory while also highlighting some of the promising new developments in French literary scholarship as practiced both in France and the US. Throughout the interview, Chaouat articulates the shortcomings of current ideologies on the Right and Left and the need for independent thinking about contemporary social problems.