James Van Horn Melton is Professor of History at Emory University, where he has served as Chair of both the Department of History and the Department of German Studies. His book The Rise of the Public in Enlightenment Europe (Cambridge University Press, 2001) has appeared in Turkish and Spanish translation, and his book Absolutism and the Eighteenth-Century Origins of Compulsory Schooling in Prussia and Austria (Cambridge University Press, 1988) won the 1990 Biennial Book Prize awarded by the Central European History Society. Melton has held fellowships from the NEH, the SSRC, the Fulbright Pro...