Recently, two of my friends (J and D) and I decided to start doing a course on Gender and Technology. We pick up readings for each week and then get together and discuss them. This is me turning this learning course into a blog opportunity.
Gender and Technology: Week 1
To Enthusiastic Beginnings
Around a few weeks back, J suggested we should do a course together. D responded enthusiastically, and I just shrugged, thinking, why not. And so began a series of decisions, which D automatically (and thankfully) took the lead on.
The first question was - what course do we do? Although all three of us have our common education background, our specific interests within that have been varied. However, there was one course in college that all of us elected to do (technically, I audited because my course load was full), and that was on Gender. It’s a topic all three of us were extremely passionate about, and continue to be even today. So when D suggested a course listed on MIT on ‘Gender and Technology’, we all jumped on board.
The course itself is I think an old one, but the site has a list of the course readings for each week. So we decided to pick up one paper a week, do our own reading, and get together every week to discuss the paper. Sort of like a self-led learning program. So D shared some of the readings and told us which one to read for the first week.
Finally, the last decision to be made was - when do we speak? It might seem like a minor task, but with one of us in India, another in Singapore, and a third in California, this was no small feat. After some back and forth, we were able to find a slot in the weekend that worked for all of us (it helps that J is only available during her night, which coincides with my morning: my most productive time).
So, armed with all these decisions, we kick-started our course. Enthusiastic, I opened up the paper to be read a few days ago. And just like that, my enthusiasm flushed away. I couldn’t understand anything in the paper. It was full of so much academic jargon that 80% of it went over my head (this, after I read each sentence 3 times). I might have spent more time complaining about the paper on our whatsapp group than actually reading it (it stirred up memories of similar issues i had back in college, and arguments with a professor on this that went over several weeks - a story for another time).
In any case, I read that paper. I highlighted sections (that I could understand and which made sense). In true college tradition, I also forgot everything I read a few minutes after reading it. On the other end, J hadn’t really complained much about the paper, and D had mentioned something about it once. So I was really curious to see if they had actually understood it.
At first go, it seemed like J certainly had. She had a full page of hand-written notes, true to her first bencher college persona. I blurted out straight away on our call that I hadn’t understood this paper. D agreed. J just looked impassively.
We decided to begin by just sharing summaries of the paper, and then take the discussion forward. Before J could launch into her page-long summary, I decided to begin - mainly to show how little I had actually understood. In what might have been a 30 second summary, I blurted out the overview as I had understood it. D nodded.
Then there was silence.
Finally, J said slowly, “Uh guys, I think I might have read the wrong paper.”
It was as true a face-palm moment as any.
I suppose the silver lining here was that at least all of us had done our reading before coming to this call; the minor downside is that J had happened to do a different reading than us. (She had picked up the first paper that D shared, and missed the message saying which paper we had to begin with. And then also spent the last few days wondering why I was complaining and building memes about a paper that she had felt was quite straightforward).
Well, we had a good laugh, and then proceeded to share our own understanding of the papers we had read (which, understandably, was fairly short for D and me).
We also used that time to decide on certain guidelines for the course going forward. So far, we only managed to add one point: Read the correct paper.
So, what with all the confusion with the reading, and trying to figure out how to take notes together, and how to really go about the rest of the course, with some tidbits of actual learning, this was as real a first week class as any before.
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Insights / Takeaways / Food for Thought
Some early insights from the readings (direct or paraphrased):
There exist many prevalent stereotypes about ‘women’ and ‘technology’, which often reflects in how men and women talk about their own aptitude with technology. Technology has largely been seen as the domain of men.
The marketing of technologies often taps into existing beliefs that we have about the different desires of men and women. For example, cars are marketed to men as ‘powerful’ and to women as ‘reliable’.
Technology has led to the promotion of two different definitions of masculinity: one, based on toughness and practical skills (like a mechanic), and the other on intellectual ability (like the software designer).
“An electric iron is not technology when a woman is pressing clothes, but it becomes technology when her husband mends it.”
In the 1970s, computers were thought of as ‘information technologies’ and associated with men; it was assumed that women would have problems with them. By the 1990s, computers were seen as ‘communication technologies’; and assumed that women could now engage with them enthusiastically.
Many of us believe that the advancement of household technology made the lives of women easier; however, in some ways it only managed to “raise cultural standards of cleanliness”, instead of actually “freeing women from domestic drudgery”.
Source: Bray, Francesca. "Gender and Technology." Annual Reviews Anthropology 36 (2007): 37–53.
Appendix:
With all due respect to the author, sharing a sample of the paper we had to read, followed by the meme it inspired.
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| The author |
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| Me |
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