The contributions of John Money: a personal view

John Money has been a dominant voice in sexology in the last part of the 20th century, breaking new ground in a wide variety of areas. In the process, he has been cantankerous, outspoken, and ever willing to do battle, but also original and thought provoking. This paper begins with an examination of science in general, moves on to psychology and sexology, and then examines Money s contributions to sexology in some detail. The latter are many and varied, including the development of the concept of gender, his theory of gender identity based on his work with intersex individuals, the John-Joan case, and his importance in establishing transsexualism as a diagnostic category and an academic discipline. Also important are his contributions to the development of the nomenclature of sexology, his importance to the sexology movement as a teacher, his significant research on a large variety of sexual topics, his ability to convince government agencies that sex was deserving of funding, and his association with the Erickson Educational Foundation. He also was a significant figure in the development of the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality (SSSS) and in raising the standard of its journal (The Journal of Sex Research), and therefore it is only fitting that an award be named after him. Though Money remains controversial, he has contributed significantly to the development of sexology as a discipline.