Generic String to Enum validator

Question

I have to validate a CSV file with a bunch of columns. Some of them need to map to various enum types. I know how to validate string value against a specific enum type, but I would like to have a generic validation method where I would pass in string value and enum type and get validation result. So far I have this:

private boolean valitateSomeSpecificEnum(String value) {
    try {
        SomeSpecificEnum.valueOf(value);
        return true;
    } catch (IllegalArgumentException e) {
        return false;
    }
}

Is it possible to have something like:

private boolean valitateAgainstTheEnum(String value, Enum<?> theEnum) {
    try {
        theEnum.valueOf(value);
        return true;
    } catch (IllegalArgumentException e) {
        return false;
    }
}

Note I'm using Enum<?> in the method signature just to make it clear what I want to achieve, I'm aware that as written it would not work.

Then I could call it like so

valitateTheEnum("foo", SomeSpecificEnum.class);

is this even possible?

Answer 1

Based on the link provided by g00se's in a comment, I've come up with this and it works:

private boolean valitateAgainstTheEnum(String value, Class<? extends Enum> theEnum) {
    try {
        Enum.valueOf(theEnum, value);
        return true;
    } catch (IllegalArgumentException e) {
        return false;
    }
}

Only question remains if there is a more elegant way to do it