 degree from the University of Arizona in sociology in 1975, and a Ph.D. from the University of Toronto, also in sociology in 1979, and then undertook post-doctoral training in anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley (1980-1982).His work included studies in sociolinguistics, and the history of social sciences (anthropology, sociology, linguistics), and extensive publications on the historical and cross-cultural social organizations of homosexuality.His main areas of fieldwork were in North America United States Mexico, Canada, and Taiwan (with his partner Keelung Hong).