In this article the author considers the differences between Foucault and Deleuze in defining the role of a philosopher as a public intellectual. The context for the analysis is the specific position of a philosopher in the academic field – between the university, where career advances may be curtailed, and the obligation to act publicly as an intellectual. The text focuses on perceptions of who a philosopher is as a “thinker” and as an “engaged intellectual” and on how these perceptions harmonized with tensions and transformations in the discipline in the twentieth century.
