This post was originally going to be my contribution to David Sehat and Mike O’Connor’s “reading of interest” series. As I thought more about it, however, it seemed that the topic of my reading—specialization—deserved stand-alone treatment. Recently I completed several essays from the John Higham collection, Hanging Together: Unity and Diversity in American Culture (edited by Carl J. Guarneri, Yale Press, 2001). I first encountered the collection in 2002-03 while studying for my doctoral field exams. My hope then was to fill out my thinking on the concept of “democratic culture,” a central idea in my dissertation. I don’t immediately Read more