GATES: What can we do personally to help those trapped at the lower edges of what we might think of as the bell curve of class?

WEST: Well, I think we've got to be quite articulate in speaking very clear and plain language about some of the sources of the social misery in inner cities as well as rural poor. This is true for poverty across the board, no matter what color.

To speak clearly means to use one's own position, status, whatever authority to accent that suffering that is so much bigger than and much more significant than whatever achievements and accomplishments that one may have made as a person or individual. So in that sense it is a matter of trying to shift a spotlight away from ourselves as professors who have succeeded and, therefore, reinforce the American dream that everyone can succeed if somehow they were to work hard and to say quite explicitly that is simply not true that we were able to work hard as many who have worked hard. We were able to cultivate our own intelligence and so forth. There are many who are highly intelligent. We were lucky we were fortunate that a combination of working hard, struggle on the one hand, and the institutions opening up.

GATES: Affirmative action.

WEST: Affirmative action, on the one hand, and some of those elites who were willing to open up those institutions. Neil Rudenstine and others... Very important because this is team work that cuts across race, but we still have to speak very clearly about why it is that so many folks still find themselves catching so much hell. And as professors, as persons concerned with not just educating persons but teaching persons how to critically and lovingly question a status quo in order to fundamentally change it, that our work becomes connected to the plights and predicaments of folk in these inner cities.

But it is connected in such a way that we are not perceived as messiahs that we do not have the power to single-handedly uplift the people. That what we do is both in realm of ideas is shape the climate of inclined opinion, and in our own lives try to exemplify the same freedom and the same compassion that we are calling for others to enact.

GATES: How do you respond when someone stands up at the end of one of your lectures and says,"what are you doing for the black community? What are you men and women at Harvard in Afro-American Studies doing for the black community? And what are you doing at Harvard anyway?"

WEST: Well, of course we would not be at Harvard if it were not for community people who sacrificed and suffered so much. So the very presence of yourself and myself at Harvard is testimony to the tremendous struggles of folk on the streets, on the blocks, in the churches, in the mosque, in the synagogues, in the temples and so on.

At the same time, we recognize that we are individuals who do freely choose. We have one life to live, and we want to try to make an impact in our way as well as live lives of decency and dignity in our way. Therefore, no community dictates to any individual how to live their lives. You can criticize and you can push but people freely choose. We can't have a freedom struggle without free choice. In terms of where you want to live and so on, but we are subject to serious scrutiny and accountability.

What I like is the spirit behind the question because all of us are accountable in some way. It ought to be accountable in a significant way especially as those who take the life of the mind seriously. We got the count of various arguments coming in. Sometimes they are ad homininum-- sometimes they are not. But you have to counter it in some way. That's what democratic process is all about. What a democratic life is all about.

In addition, though, I would say you have to fight in the life of the mind as well as fight in the streets, as well as fight in the courts, as well as fight in congress and the White House. Every site is a sight of contestation. There are various forms of weaponry, intellectual weaponry, spiritual weaponry, political weaponry, economic weaponry. Because we are on the battlefield, and there are bullets flying, some symbolic, some literal and the life of the mind is a crucial place where the battle goes on. Your work, William Julius Wilson's work, bell hook's work, a whole host of persons play a crucial role on that battlefield.

But to be on that battlefield you have to equip yourself, you have to be prepared; you had to be disciplined; you have to be prepared; you have to read; you have to write; you have to converse; you have to lecture; you have to teach....That is similarly true with our pens; that is similarly true with sculptures; that is similarly true with engineers and physicists and chemists and so forth. That's why there is no one model or one paradigm that dictates how all black people ought to do and say.

GATES: How much ideological freedom though do we tolerate within the black community? I mean Clarence Thomas recently was on the cover of Emerge magazine with a handkerchief on his head. Then he was on the cover on Emerge again in the position of a black jockey. I mean where does critique start...

WEST: I think we must never, ever demonize one another. That's true not just black people to black people; that's human being to human being. We must never so thoroughly disrespect someone that they are beyond the pale and, therefore, have no possibility of being changed. This is part of the struggle with Minister Louis Farrakhan of his being so demonized by the mainstream, we had to come back and criticize but not demonize and see him as a human being who is concerned about suffering and yet warrants a certain critique as well.

Clarence Thomas must never be demonized. He ought to be deeply criticized, ought not to be disrespected in terms of having his humanity called into question even though a person like myself may have very deep disagreements with him. It's so easy to begin to demonize someone you think is so far removed and as the demonization begins to expand, it ends up being everybody but your friends. After a while everybody else but you. That is a slippery slope that is so easy to slide down, and that's what is dangerous. So there ought to be a robust, uninhibited conversation in black America with different black ideological perspectives.

GATES: Right, without fear of being thrown out of the race.

WEST: Without fear being thrown out of the room or the race, but your argument might be weak; and your vision might be trite.

GATES: Do you feel guilty about your own success?

WEST: Well, success is such a relative thing for me. I'm fundamentally a Christian which means that ultimately all of these penultimate titles and things you just had to wear with a loose garment. Really. There is a sense in which the quality of one's life and the richness of one's spirit is ultimately the benchmark. If you can't have a good time and smile and relate to people across race and class, then the success that you have ultimately is just sounding brass and tinkling symbol.

Not only that but life is such a mysterious thing that you are up one day; you are down the next day. A lot of the homeless brothers and sisters who were a success ten years ago, they are now on the street. Maybe ten years later they will be a success, but the crucial question is what is the quality of their life. Who are they loving? Who's loving them? Can they still smile and make through all this darkness and thunder that every human being has to deal with on the way to death. In that sense, you can textualize it within that framework, which for me is a Christian framework, it becomes much more relative than people view it oftentimes.

GATES: Well, how do we turn or transform the guilt of the survivor--which a lot of those in the new black middle class, the affirmative action crossover generation has-- into a commitment to services you put so well in your last book?

WEST: Well, if you are always trying to do something for a cause bigger than you-- connected with serving others--then it is hard to be guilty. You have to do that without resentment. You have to do that without condescension or attempt to do that without paternalism and haughtiness and arrogance. But if you are continually trying to engage in that kind of action, then that survivors guilt will become marginal in the feel of the moment. You will continually evolve.

GATES: Julian Bond told me yesterday that the Joint Center has just done a study, which is not public yet, showing that one million more black men voted in 1996 than voted in 1992. To what do you attribute that?

WEST: Well, it's something that happened in black America on the male side, and the female side is already been of course involved in a tremendous vibrant movement of womanism and redefining womens' role and critiquing patriarchy, and the black male has had a tremendous time adjusting to this.

I think as a result of discussion, the Million Man March has played a very important role in being provocative which is to say provoking us to reflect on the very distinctive plight and predicament of black men. Whether one agreed with the march or not, whether one was critical with Minister Louis Farrakhan or not, we all have to get Minister Louis Farrakhan credit for calling the march in such a way that it generated this tremendous discourse, tremendous conversation, this tremendous soul searching actually.

One result has been an increase in black male volunteerism and churches and social service agencies as well as voting. So I think we have to seize on this motion. The question is how do you translate that imagery into something that has much more institutional and structural transforming possibilities. That's a challenge. But you cannot talk about these institutional changes without talking about how people feel about themselves, whether they trust one another, whether they are willing to work together whether they are willing to affirm one another because as long as we are distrusting and disrespecting one another, we can have the best vision analysis in the world; it's not getting off the ground.

GATES: Is there a role for the churches of this process?

WEST: A fundamental role. If the churches don't move, much of the community won't move. We've got a situation in which a black church is still a major institution in the black community where 55 percent of the black folk attend and over 75 pass through its doors. How can we talk about the black community without talking about the black church. The black church is dormant, much of the community is dormant. If the black church is leaning toward the right, much of the community is leaning toward the right. If it is leaning in the left wing direction having repercussions. Now of course these are in relation to issues. Labor, patriarchy, homophobia, all these are different issues. Some churches can move right on one issue, left on another issue very much like the Catholic church. Progressive on labor and retrograde on women. You find that as paradigmatic on a number of churches across the board. There is a crucial role for persons like myself, Christians still deeply concerned about the progressive potential of the black church and who has a deep love of not just those people who sit on those pews but also believe that the gospel when preached can actually make a difference in people's lives.

GATES: But can it really make a difference in the lives of the post-modern gangster culture that is for so many people very unhealthy and a reflection of deep trial and tribulation within the African-American community

WEST: Well, keep in mind when we talk about gangster mentality in America, I think it is best to start at the White House, State House, City Hall, school, mosque, church, synagogue and then get the gangster rap. Because they are all on the same continuum. We are talking about levels of corruption, levels of graft, trying to avoid the 11th commandment -- thou shalt not get caught getting over by any means. That's a very, very human thing. A very American thing to go from elites to across middle classes all the way down.

GATES: And has a long history.

WEST: Has a long history going back to Adam. But the problem is when you have gangster mentalities at work among disadvantaged folk, it's even more devastating because often times it is much less regulated, less priority put on it and so on. So in that regard I do believe that not just the churches but strong communities, strong trade unions, strong families can make a difference in terms of producing persons much more virtuous than what one usually finds in a gangster culture. But they cannot do it alone. You have to have those jobs of minimum wage. You have to have that healthcare. You have to have that child care. You have to have good schools. You have to have some sense of joy and ecstasy in one's life be it personal or be it communal and yet churches can make a contribution. There is no doubt about it. Historically black churches have made a crucial contribution is sustaining that kind of black sanity and black joy. But churches never have been able to do it by themselves with the economy in the state that it is with the role of the nation state being what it is, but they certainly can play a role.

GATES: Given the reluctance of any system that perceives itself as functioning and profitable to change, I worry quite a lot that the two nations within the black community are destined to stay two nations. Two nations defined by class. Are you optimistic?

WEST: No, I am not optimistic, but I've never been optimistic about humankind or America. The evidence never looks good in terms of forces for good actually becoming prominent. But I am a prisoner of hope, and that's very different. I believe that we do have signs of hope, and that the evidence is underdetermined. We have to make a leap of faith beyond the evidence and try to energize one another so we can accent the best in one another. But that is what being a prisoner of hope is all about.

GATES: What are the signs of hope that you see?

WEST: I just see many good, decent people willing to fight, willing to serve. I see it on a local level; I see it on a regional level; I see new organizations sprouting up. You got new parties here. Labor parties here. You got progressives in the Democratic party trying to make sense of the republicrats like President Clinton. People who are not giving in to despair though they have a sense of just how despairing is. They refuse to give in to despair. They have the courage to love and the courage to serve and the courage to fight.

There are millions of people around this country like that. They are signs of hope. Unfortunately, they are not as organized as corporate America; they are not as powerful as the big finance is as effective in bringing their various ins and aims to bear, but there are certainly signs of hope. As long as they are around, it's like it's worthwhile.

GATES: Can we organize this new class of leader -- I mean as you said, there weren't professors at Harvard; there weren't Vernon Jordan's around in 1967. Can't we, referring to your statement about the crisis of black leadership, can we begin to think about this new group of people as possessing enormous potential for leadership?

WEST: Oh, sure. I mean you talk about Vernon Jordan, Ken Chenault, these are just highly talented and intelligent persons who can bring tremendous amounts of insight to a movement. But as we know, the highly intelligent and the highly trained have no monopoly on courage. In the end it is going to be the question of those who are willing to fight and sacrifice, which means that we have to look at a variety of different places. It could be among the working poor, the very poor; it could be the middle classes; it could be the working classes; no class has a monopoly on courage and vision. It is fundamentally a question of choice and courage as a matter of cultivating the discipline necessary to serve, and that is something that cuts across class.

GATES: And in being optimistic enough...having enough hope to want to serve.

WEST: Absolutely right. But when you are fundamentally committed to something that is right, you just decide to go down fighting. Period. No matter what it looks like. That's the best of the blues people.