Chomsky: Ideas and Ideals Book

This took me a while to read because it's so full of information and I often had to check other publications, I also put it on hold a couple of times because of other school work. I'm studying Applied Linguistics and I had a bit of a grasp on the topics having studied some syntax and psycholinguistics, and I do think that anyone wanting to understand the first chapters (specially chapter 2: the linguistic foundation) should have a bit of a linguistic background. All in all it's a great intro to Chomsky's work because it deals both with his proposals and the critiques of his work and Neil Smith writes in a very agreeable manner.

The last chapter (chapter 5: language and freedom) deals with Chomsky's philosophy as related to his incursions into political activism and his opinions on world events. It's also very interesting but it's definitely not what I know him for. I realize he's better known by non-linguists because of these opinions, but I appreciate his linguistic work a bit more.