“What's gotten in the way of education in the United States is a theory of social engineering that says there is ONE RIGHT WAY to proceed with growing up.”

“That's what education should be," I said, "the art of orientation. Educators should devise the simplest and most effective methods of turning minds around. It shouldn't be the art of implanting sight in the organ, but should proceed on the understanding that the organ already has the capacity, but is improperly aligned and isn't facing the right way.”

“The United States of America was once a great nation... but this United States is not the one our founding fathers set out to build over 200 years ago. This United States stands for everything its citizens have fought against throughout its history: oppression, unwarranted violence against innocent and weaker countries or its own citizens, trampling of human rights, crooked legal systems, and socialism.”

“And what is the problem? It is the old problem of the anxious searcher - the mythic in the interior castle, the poet-pilgrim in a dark wood not sure how to proceed. Which way is the right way?”

“Despite long-standing claims by elites that Blacks, women, Latinos, and other similarly derogated groups in the United States remain incapable of producing the type of interpretive, analytical thought that is labeled theory in the West, powerful knowledges of resistance that toppled former social structures of social inequality repudiate this view. Members of these groups do in fact theorize, and our critical social theory has been central to our political empowerment and search for justice.”

“Perhaps the most instructive experience is to see the way governments all over the world are exclaiming, "What are we going to do about the United States?!”