"When I think of the relationship between artists and society ... I think of the word "transcendent." ... By "transcendent" I mean the artist [should transcend] the immediate. Transcend the here and now. Transcend the madness of the world. ...

"I use [the word "transcendent"] to suggest that the role of the artist is to transcend conventional wisdom, to transcend the word of the establishment, to transcend the orthodoxy, to go beyond and escape what is handed down by the government or what is said in the media. ...

"It is the job of the artist to ... think outside the boundaries of permissible thought and dare to say things that no one else will say. ..."

from the great, paradigm-changing historian Howard Zinn (1922-2010) in his artists in times of war (2003).