Country United States Media type Print (Hardcover) ISBN 978-0-06-014541-5 Page count 550 | Language English Pages 550 Originally published 1972 | |
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Subject Non-fiction literature on Homosexuality Editors Alan P. Bell, Martin S. Weinberg Similar Martin S Weinberg books, Other books | ||
Homosexuality: An Annotated Bibliography is a 1972 bibliography of non-fiction literature on homosexuality, edited by psychologist Alan P. Bell and sociologist Martin S. Weinberg. Produced with the help of the American National Institute of Mental Health and written with the aid of summarizing research into homosexuality, it contains 1265 items, with an emphasis on psychology, psychiatry, and sociology. Multiple authors are represented, in some cases under pseudonyms. Together with Homosexualities: A Study of Diversity Among Men and Women (1978), Homosexuality: An Annotated Bibliography is part of a series of books that culminated in the publication of Sexual Preference in 1981. The work was favorably reviewed and is considered important.
Contents
Background
In 1967, the Institute for Sex Research proposed to the National Institute of Mental Health that a summary of research into homosexuality should be made. As a result of this proposal, Homosexuality: An Annotated Bibliography was begun in January 1969, made possible through support given to the Institute for Sex Research by the National Institute of Mental Health. Bell and Weinberg hoped to make evident "to the population at large that there is much that we do not know about homosexuality and that homosexuality must be considered from many different vantage points if more is ever to be learned." They commented that the items included in the bibliography were of uneven quality, indicating that "discussions of homosexuality have consisted primarily of speculations prompted by theoretical models or statements whose constructs have not been tested in any systematic manner."
Summary
Homosexuality: An Annotated Bibliography is a survey of non-fiction literature pertaining to homosexuality published in English (including translations of foreign-language material) between 1940 and 1968. It contains 1265 items, with an emphasis on psychology, psychiatry, and sociology. It includes books and articles listed as written by the following authors (some of the names given are pseudonyms, but none are indicated as such by Bell and Weinberg):
Scholarly reception
Hugo G. Beigel reviewed Homosexuality: An Annotated Bibliography in the Journal of Sex Research. Sociologist Edward Sagarin wrote in Contemporary Sociology that Bell and Weinberg's work overshadowed a similar anthology, Homosexuality: A Selective Bibliography of over 3,000 Items, edited by William Parker. Sagarin noted that while the book contained fewer items than Parker's, they were all "carefully selected, read and abstracted, and then all the material cross-indexed in a manner that almost defies improvement." Bell wrote in Archives of Sexual Behavior that in his view he and Weinberg had provided a "comprehensive statement" of the past and present state of research into homosexuality in Homosexuality: An Annotated Bibliography. Anthropologist Paul Gebhard, writing in Homosexualities: A Study of Diversity Among Men and Women, described Homosexuality: An Annotated Bibliography as "an important part" of the Institute for Sex Research's work on homosexuality.
Bell and Weinberg, writing with sociologist Sue Kiefer Hammersmith, noted that their work Sexual Preference (1981) was the culmination of a series of publications that began with Homosexuality: An Annotated Bibliography and included Homosexualities: A Study of Diversity Among Men and Women. Fang-fu Ruan and Yung-mei Tsai, writing in Archives of Sexual Behavior, criticized Homosexuality: An Annotated Bibliography for failing to list "a single study or recording on Chinese homosexual life".