Unsettled Scripts: Intimacy Narratives of Heterosexual Single Mothers

cultural scenarios with narratives of individuals in their specific social contexts and also their internal (intrapsychic) world of desires, fantasies and expectations (which I refer to as ‘personal scripts’). While the concept of ‘scripts’ does not offer a wider analysis of structural constraints on individuals, it is a helpful way of understanding the limitations on what is culturally available in terms of intimate behaviours. As Jackson and Scott (2007) argue, in terms of sexual lives, scripts are ‘improvisations on the sexual themes available to us through our culture and experience’ (Jackson and Scott, 2007, p.170). Gagnon and Simon’s template for understanding choices and behaviour, allows for ways in which we are culturally and socially shaped while enabling a conception of a creative social actor who in turn shapes their social milieu: ‘The possibility of a lack of congruence between the abstract scenario and the concrete situation must be resolved by the creation of interpersonal scripts. This is a process that transforms the social actor from being exclusively an actor to being a partial scriptwriter or adapter shaping the materials of relevant cultural scenarios into scripts for behaviour in particular contexts. Interpersonal scripting is the mechanism through which appropriate identities are made congruent with desired expectations.’ (Simon and Gagnon, 1999, p.29) Three interrelated but distinct dimensions of sexual scripting are identified – cultural, interpersonal and intrapsychic (Gagnon and Simon, 1973). ‘Cultural scenarios’ or ‘cultural narratives’ are constructed around sexuality and these circulate within society, providing guides for sexual conduct. An example would include public debates about sexual morality (often highlighting single parenthood in the UK) which may well be highly gendered (Laumann and Gagnon, 1995). Cultural narratives form part of a repertoire of resources on which people draw to make sense of their own sexual (and / or intimate) lives and there are many competing available cultural narratives. ‘Interpersonal scripting’ emerges from and is deployed within everyday interaction in specific contexts. Social actors may co-construct scripts in relationships and everyday intimate practices, although this does not necessarily imply equal participation in a mutually agreed script, especially where gendered dynamics come into play (Laumann and Gagnon, 1995). ‘Intrapsychic scripting’ occurs at the level of individual desires and