A critical study of John Money's contribution to the sexological concept of 'paraphilia' (360G-Wellcome-092089_Z_10_Z)

The project undertakes a critical investigation of the understudied concept of 'paraphilia' in the work of New Zealand-born sexologist, John William Money (1921-2006). I trace Money's debt to the foundational European texts of sexology of the late-nineteenth century that first described the sexual 'perversions' and posed them as a social and moral threat under the umbrella discourse of 'degeneration'. I explore the logic of Money's theorization of abnormal sexual development, and the practices for treating sex offenders that he pioneered at Johns Hopkins University in the 1980s and 1990s. By bringing attention to the importance of Money's work on this subject, the commonplace assumption that twentieth-century sexology is very far removed from the presuppositions and values underlying its nineteenth-century counterpart is called into question. Moreover, the project demonstrates the extent to which the significance of the diagnostic category of 'paraphilia' in twentieth-century Anglo-American sexology has been overlooked. Finally, the project offers a fuller and more accurate picture of a key figure in the history of sexual medicine than is currently available, as most published scholarship on Money focuses uniquely on his contribution to debates about gender identity, notably, his controversial involvement with the 'John/Joan' case in the 1960s.