William Simon

William Simon (1930–2000) was a sociologist of human sexualities between 1970 and 2000. His co-authored book, Sexual Conduct: The Social Sources of Human Conduct played a role in shaping the contemporary sociology of sexuality and critical sexualities studies. His work helped formulate a theory of sexual scripting and he was an advocate of sexual tolerance. He was an early advocate of gay rights and testified against obscenity laws.

He "brought a postmodernist sensibility to a field long bound by historical assumptions", wrote the New York Times, describing his belief "that there are no fixed points in the geography of sexuality, merely an ever-changing terrain that has less to do with biology than with accidents of history."

Life William Simon was born on July 20, 1930, the son of Russian immigrants. As a child, he lived in the Bronx, before moving to Detroit in 1940.

Their work inspired many to think critically and seriously about human sexuality as a theoretical problem. Their influence has been acknowledged in the works of Jeffrey Weeks, Gayle Rubin, Jeffrey Escoffier, Michael Kimmel, Stevi Jackson, Ken Plummer and others. A key concept Simon and Gagnon formulated was that of sexual scripts: they developed the significance of scripts as a metaphor for understanding human sexualities. In their view, human sexuality far from being a simple biological drive should be seen as a socially organized sexual script. They wrote: "We see sexual behavior therefore as scripted behavior, not the masked expression of a primordial drive". From this, Gagnon and Simon proceeded to investigate three layers of scripting: historical and cultural, interactive and interpersonal, as well as its intra-personal or intra-psychic dimensions.

Looking at later separate contributions, Gagnon took a more empirical and sociological turn drawing from methodology and Durkheim) whilst Simon continued to have a more political bent whilst simultaneously showing a greater interest in intra-psychic scripting under the influence of the psychoanalytic works of Robert Stoller (1924–1991) and Heinz Kohut (1913–1981).

Simon's major ideas can be found in his final book, Postmodern Sexualities (2006). The irony of his work that while he spent much of his professional life trying to improve the social conditions of the sexual worlds of others, he was also trying to suggest that sex may not even be as important as people try to make it. It may indeed not harbor some grand truths of our life, society and being. As he said:

His final paper was "The Fuzzy Matrix of 'My Type'".

Honors In 1986, he was awarded the Distinguished Contribution from the Society for the Scientific Study of Sex. The Sexualities Section of the American Sociological Association has awarded its John H. Gagnon and William Simon award for distinguished work in sexualities studies annually since 2001.

Selected works 1996 Postmodern Sexualities, London: Routledge 1994 "Deviance as History: The Future of Perversion", Archives of Sexual Behavior, January 1994 1990 "Oral Sex: A Critical Overview", in June Reinsch, Vollmer, Godlestein, AIDS and Sex 1984 "Sexual Scripts," Society, vol. 22, no. 1, November–December, 1984, 53–60 (with John Gagnon) 1973 Sexual Conduct: The Social Sources of Human Sexuality, Chicago: Aldine Books, 1973 (with John Gagnon) 1969 "On Psychosexual Development," in David A. Goslin, ed., Handbook of Socialization Theory and Research New York: Rand McNally, 1969, 733–752 (with John Gagnon). Reprinted in Trans-action, 6:5: March, 1969, 9–17, 17–23 (with John Gagnon) 1967 Sexual Deviance: A Reader, edited with an introduction written with John Gagnon, New York: Harper and Row, 1967 1967 "Homosexuality, The Formulation of a Sociological Perspective," The Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 8:3: September, 1967, 177–185 (with John Gagnon) Sexualities, vol. 4 no. 2, May 2001, contains a bibliography of his work