More than 2,000 people gathered in force outside the University’s largest lecture hall on Wednesday. For Eugene, masses like this are uncommon. But, for famed speaker and political dissident Noam Chomsky, crowds assembled three hours early on campus, sprawling through 13th Avenue, bustling with excitement.
“I think it will be a really valuable experience,” University sociology major Chelsea Miller said. “It’s important to take advantage when you’re at a university like this and they get big speakers like him.”
Sporting his signature blue cardigan, the lauded activist, political theorist, linguist and professor was greeted by an eager standing ovation. Packed to capacity, the expansive 150 Columbia roared with applause.
Attendee Sanaa Hodroje smiled widely as she rose from her chair, clapping with eyes gleaming. Hodroje traveled eight hours from Vancouver, British Columbia, to see Chomsky in person.
The lecture, titled “Global Hegemony: The Facts, the Images,” was sponsored by the University’s English department as part of its third-annual Collins Distinguished Speaker Series.
“This particular series is devoted to three concepts: modernity, ethnicity and globality” said David Li, a University English professor and event organizer. “I’ve been following (Chomsky) for many years, and he represents the kind of politics that our nation desperately needs.”
Chomsky lectured for an hour, elaborating on the history of political power’s consolidation in the U.S. and the current social, economic and political inequalities present in contemporary society.
He traced the development of enhanced corporate influence on contemporary politics back to the 1970s. After the end of World War II, he explained, the victors laid the basis for an international economic system that established decades of unparalleled economic growth.
Before the Reagan administration, “there was no financial crisis. No New Deal. The regulatory apparatus was still in place,” he said.
“The lowest quintile did about as well as well as the highest quintile.”
For Chomsky, this was a time of greater equality.
He described the current concentration of wealth — saturated by major financial and corporate institutions, which Chomsky referred to as the “masters of mankind”  — as unsustainable and in violation of capitalist principles.
“There will be another fiscal crisis. That’s almost certain,” he said. “We don’t have to accept the situation where Goldman Sachs is giving themselves huge compensations for having tanked the economy, and at the same time watch(ing) Congress cut back everything that’s needed for the population to survive.”
Chomsky admonished the emphasis on lowering the country’s deficit while public programs continue to suffer. More concern must be paid to public programs, he explained, such as education, Social Security and Medicare.
“If you defund the system and privatize it, it will be worse,” he said. “But it’s fine for the rich. They’ll be taken care of.”
While thousands had lined up to attend the event, only 844 people claimed seats. More than 1,000 were turned away, and approximately 200 huddled outside the room, listening to the Chomsky’s voice over speakers.
“He’s such a hugely influential academic figure. He’s one of those people who has been so instrumental in shaping my views and my understanding of the world,” University junior Eric Cole said. “This is why you go to college: to hopefully get opportunities like this.”
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-December 7, 1928: Born to Jewish parents in Philadelphia
-Age 10: Identifying with anarchist politics from an early age, wrote his first article while at Oak Lane Country Day School in Blue Bell, Penn., about the spread of fascism in Spain during the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War
-1945: Began studying philosophy and linguistics at the University of Pennsylvania
-1949: Married Carol Schatz, a fellow linguist, and raises two daughters, Aviva and Diane
-1955: Received a Ph.D. in linguistics from the University of Pennsylvania and conducts part of his doctoral research during a four-year stint at Harvard University
-1955: Joined the staff of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
-1961: Appointed as a full professor at MIT’s Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics
-1967: Cemented his views in opposition of the Vietnam War with the publication of the essay “The Responsibility of Intellectuals” in the New York Review of Books
-2005: Voted the leading living public intellectual in the 2005 Global Intellectuals Poll conducted by the British magazine Prospect
-2006: Released a book on anarchism titled “Chomsky on Anarchism,” published by the anarchist book collective AK Press
-2010: Israeli authorities detain Chomsky and refuse his entry into the West Bank from Jordan