Chomsky and me : a memoir / Bev Boisseau Stohl.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Boisseau Stohl, Bev, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Linguists.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (244 pages)

Place of Publication:

New York : OR Books, [2023]

Summary:

Bev Stohl ran the MIT office of the renowned linguist and social critic Noam Chomsky for nearly two and a half decades. This is her account of those years, working next to a man described by the New York Times as "arguably the most important intellectual alive today." Through these pages we observe the comings and goings of a constant and varied stream of visitors: the historian Howard Zinn; activists Alex Carey, Peggy Duff, and Dorie Ladner; the inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners Lee; actors Catherine Keener and Wallace Shawn; the writer Norman Mailer; gaggles of fourteen-year-old school students, and the world's leading linguists. All make appearances in these stories. Many who visit are as careless of their allotted time as Chomsky is generous with his. Shepherding them out in mid-conversation is one of Bev's more challenging responsibilities. Other duties include arranging lectures to overflow crowds around the world, keeping unscrupulous journalists at bay, preventing teetering ziggurats of paper and books from engulfing her boss, and switching on his printer when it is deemed "broken" by a mind that is engaged less by mundane technology than the realms of academia and activism. Over the years, what has commenced as a formal working arrangement blossoms into something more: a warm and enduring friendship that involves work trips to Europe, visits with her partner and dog to Noam's summer home on Cape Cod, and a mentorship that challenges Bev with all manner of intriguing mental and practical puzzles. Published with the approval of its subject and written with affection, insight and a gentle sense of humor, Chomsky and Me describes a relationship between two quite different people who, through the happenstance of work, form a bond that is both surprising and reciprocally rich.

Contents:

Front Cover

Back Cover

Half-Title Page

Title Page

Copyright Page

Dedication

Contents

PART I: What Is This Place, and How (and Why) Have I Landed Here?

1 My Kind of Sufi-Awakenings: Late 2012

2 An Offer I Could Have Refused

3 Meeting Noam Chomsky and Getting to Know His MIT World

4 The Unabomber, Rage, and Bad Religion: 1995-1996

5 Leaving Building 20

6 Lost and Found at Stata: 2004

7 Roxy Joins Us at Stata

8 Convenient Blindness

9 Noam Chomsky in Bev's Hometown

PART II: Life After Carol

10 Figuring Out a New Normal

11 Howard Zinn

12 The Man Who Couldn't Say No: 2010

13 Oy to the World

14 Our Danny Boy: May 2011

15 Spell Cast (All Keyed Up): 2011

16 Activism and the Vietnam War

17 Cape Crusaders

18 Zoned Out

PART III: Traveling Chomsky-Style

19 Italy: September 2012

20 Don't Mind Me

21 His Mug Runneth Over: December 2012

22 The Tie Project: February 2013

23 Dublin: And I Must Bide, April 2013

24 Trouble in Beantown: Boston Marathon Bombings, 4/15/13

25 Pleading Computer Insanity

26 Rome's International Science Festival and the Vatican

PART IV: Some Things Change, Some Stay the Same

27 May Day

28 Stayin' Alive

29 Found Again: Early 2015

PART V: To Everything, There Is a Season

30 January 2016: Moving Toward Wrapping Things Up

31 Time Out

32 Looking Back

33 A Good Friday: April 2017

34 Noam Shares His News with Bev and Glenn: May 2017

35 Bev's Retirement Party: June 2017

36 Tuesday, July 11, 2017: Our Last Day Together

Afterword

Acknowledgments

About the Author.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

1-68219-380-2

OCLC:

1381712862