Who's a public intellectual?

The article focuses on the essay "British sociology and public intellectuals: consumer society and imperial decline," by Bryan Turner, from an American perspective. George Ritzer argues that America has even less public sociologists than Great Britain, and discusses the lack of media interest in sociology in the United States. While the discussion of consumer culture is a topic of interest in the United States, as demonstrated by Morgan Spurlock's book, "Don't Eat This Book," the American public is not interested in the topic from a legitimate sociological standpoint.