Straying From Specialization: The Race to Decorate Ourselves With Unnecessary Skills
In a discussion with my mom about students today who are forced to play the piano, she brought up the Chinese pianist Lang Lang. She posed a question I couldn’t easily dismiss: how would Lang Lang have discovered his passion for piano had his father not relentlessly pushed him through the obstacles he faced with the instrument at a young age? Truth is, while Lang Lang was able to find his niche, countless children are shuttled between piano lessons, sports practices, and language tuition centers, driven by a parent’s belief that a “well-rounded” portfolio—however shallow or superficial—secures futures.
Although the idea of specialization—the relentless honing of a single skill under the impression that it's nigh-perfectable—has dominated human pursuit for centuries, a counterculture is gaining ground. There is a seductive narrative that prestigious colleges are looking for applicants who excel across various domains, successful in everything from Rowing to Model UN. David Epstein’s Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World (2019) directly challenged Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers, which argued for focused mastery of one skill. With these ideas afloat, it’s worth taking a step back and asking whether we’ve abandoned specialization too quickly.
Today, these skills, alongside modern counterparts, remain mostly exclusive to high-income families with the time and resources to curate and “decorate” a child’s portfolio.
Historical precedent suggests that many of these peripheral skills were taught foremost for vanity. Among European nobility, future heirs were equipped early on with the skills needed to rule a country: etiquette, diplomacy, and a wide breadth of languages. In order to signal status superiority, they also acquired more ostentatious skills such as fencing, archery, and horseback riding. Today, these skills, alongside modern counterparts, remain mostly exclusive to high-income families with the time and resources to curate and “decorate” a child’s portfolio.
…others almost definitely hold the perception that having a diversified skillset is what enriches them as a university applicant, lifelong learner, and appreciator of high-end cultures.
As a student in a private international school, where the majority have these resources, modern equivalents of these showy peripheral skills that constitute “culturedness” are proliferated. While these skills have been justified by citing the various cognitive benefits, reasoning often cycles back to fostering vague platitudes like “lifelong enrichment through the arts.” These reasons are exacerbated in the tiger-parenting-prevalent environment of Asia. A study revealed that dance and performing arts training in China largely exists to push students to “improve their aesthetic level.” While many individuals in these studies certainly share Lang Lang’s passion, others almost definitely hold the perception that having a diversified skillset is what enriches them as a university applicant, lifelong learner, and appreciator of high-end cultures.
In his Republic, Plato theorizes the “Arcadian Idyll,” also known as Kallipolis, as a somewhat extreme vision of specialization employing the complete division of labor. Yet, Plato’s rigid society somehow seems appealing when measured against our status quo. In the Kallipolis, each citizen must fulfill their designated role in their society, a craft that must be loved and carefully honed. This signifies a “most optimal thing” that we can invest our time and energy into. The one born with good hearing and dexterity should and naturally will love music, and the one with good strength and stamina should and naturally will love athleticism. For Plato, this is less a moral rule than a practical observation about human limitations. Time spent elsewhere is time spent not honing the skill you’re contributing to society.
Organizing society this way offers an additional set of benefits in the real world. With each person immersed in a distinct craft via love and affinity, fields such as computer science are less likely to face the issues related to oversaturation. On the other end of the spectrum, this change in mindset would help us foster a more authentic appreciation for the fields currently linked to unemployment because of perceived “uselessness.” Fewer people would be shut out by competitors chasing prestige over passion. We’ll never know if Lang Lang was meant to be an Olympic athlete or a Michelin-level chef. The fact that he was arbitrarily pushed into piano meant it’s what he stuck with for the rest of his life. I also proposed that, theoretically, someone less fortunate who did have an affinity for the piano lost their opportunity to pursue a musical career because they were overshadowed by Lang Lang.
It is true that simply obsessing over one thing isn’t always the best way to improve. We get tired and burn out, and different skills support one another, more often than not; the biologist will need public speaking to present their ideas well at a conference. But no matter what combination of time sucks is being employed, it relies on cohesiveness, something entirely absent from the resume of the CS applicant who also captains the swim team and plays trombone in the jazz band.
This is, admittedly, a thought experiment acknowledging a growing culture of branching out over specialization. It’s unlikely that some of the extreme circumstances and consequences described can be met in the real world. However, in a world growing with competition and hierarchy, it’s useful to think about what each of us can do to make sure everyone finds their spot in society, rather than clustering around the same narrow set of decorative and superficial accomplishments. As we continue to prize breadth for its own sake, it’s worth asking why we’ve come to celebrate being stretched thin more than being truly committed.