Davis, Chapter 3, Specialization as Monomania

This chapter was interesting to me in that it discussed specialization as an obsession.  I feel it is important that we have people in society that specialize in certain fields but it is equally as important that we have people in society who are "jack of all trades" so to say.  Our class discussion solidified that for me.  As important as it is for someone to be the "best in their field" and to know everything there is about a specific subject or idea, we also need people who know a little bit about many subjects or ideas.  The latter are those who may be the ones that tie things together or see relationships between ideas or subjects that those who specialize may not see.

Sir Francis Galton was obsessed with science and in reading about him I was struck by how dedicated he seemed to feel about his field.  Granted, Davis talks about how he had breakdowns from time to time, but had Galton not been obsessed we would not have all the great things that he discovered and developed.  His attention to detail did seem a bit neurotic at times, actually most of the time, but he seemed to thrive when he was "working" until he became too obsessed, and he would have a breakdown. 

At the end of the chapter when Davis discusses madness as normal, I can see how he ties science, specialization, overwork and obsession together.  During the 19th century the modern world was changing rather quickly with Industrialization and society had to change quickly as well.  It seems as though he is trying to say that everything was becoming a blur - overworking was seen as obsessing, science was seen as obsessing, specialization was seen as obsessing and obsessing was also seen as all three.

Davis, Chapter 2, The Emergence of Obsession

It's funny how words make you think about other things.  The author begins the chapter by discussing "monomania" and how it indicates the beginning of the term obsession.  It immediately made me think of Beatlemania and how when the media talks about the Beatles and this time period they always show large groups of young women going ga ga over the band.  They seemed to be obsessed with the Beatles. 

So much of the history of OCD seems to be related to religion, culture and class.  How ironic in that today we feel that everyone is equal regardless of one's religion, culture and class - at least that is the picture the US wants out there.  Today these three aspects of peoples lives are not to be thought of as far as diagnosing and treating OCD or any other medical or mental disorder where in the past the specialists felt that some of these things caused the disorders.  In the past "monomania" was something people wanted, desired.  The author whose article was published in the American Journal of Insanity insinuated that the disease affected those with large active brains - I guess trying to say that those with monomania are more intelligent because they have a bigger brain.  I had to laugh to myself with reference to this statement and other similar ones.   

I had never thought about how many classic novels have some sort of referrence or a character with OCD.  The authors mentioned, Dickens, Shelley and Balzac were all ahead of their time as far as portraying the disease.  For something that was thought of in such a different way so long ago and to still be recognized as the disease today just goes to show how far science and research has gone.

The last section really made me think about the difference between the idea of a Renaissance man or woman and the idea of specialization in one particular area.  You would think that in order to be the "best"  forensic scientist you would have to spend much of your time studying and reading about that particular field.  The same holds true for specific fields of law and medicine.  With the amount of information out there that one is expected to know, one would have to be obsessed in order to retain the massive amounts of information. I hadn't thought about "specializing" as obsessive before reading this chapter, but I now think of it in a different way.

It is interesting that OCD was known by so many other diseases prior to it's current name.  I wonder what it will be known as n the future......