User:Artemis gryllaki/Thesis Outline

Thesis Outline First Draft

I. Introduction

Background:
This summer I got an email which was an open call for participation in The Eclectic Tech Carnival (/ETC), a gathering of feminists who critically explore and develop everyday skills and information technologies in the context of free speech, free software and open hardware. While reading the description, I wondered why this international group of people, identified by their gender, have the need to gather in their own spaces in order to speak about computing, technology, art and activism.

Thesis Statement:
There is an urgent need to discuss and shed light on the problematic issues of Technology and Software development, as gender-biased fields. In order to imagine alternative inclusive environments for collective knowledge production and Do It Together practices, feminist and activist collective work needs to be documented, archived, shared and protected. This is essential in order to learn from the histories of these movements and shape future imperatives.

II. Body

First Topic: Hidden history or underrepresentation of female contributors in technology.
Different kinds of historical accounts shape our understandings and assumptions about technology.

1. The women who built "ENIAC" were until recently, written out of historical accounts.
2. Wikipedia as a mirror of the world's gender biases. Women in Red (WiR) is a WikiProject whose objective is to turn "redlinks" into blue ones.

Second Topic: Technology is situated and shaped by the social relations that produce and use it.
Technologies are gendered by design and use.

1. Technological objects that convey patriarchal ideologies and reveal gender inequality.

Third Topic: Experiences of people in IT environments differ according to their gender
The IT field is appropriated by men and reproduces a "male geek culture" which pushes out female and gender diverse people.

1. Stories and anecdotes from the biography of Ellen Ullman "Life in Code: A Personal History of Technology"
2. Interviews from women programmers in software companies, tech forums, floss communities...

III. Conclusion

The Topics mentioned are relevant and urgent to be addressed in today's technology landscape. Various communities, groups, and collectives are formed in order to shape a response to these matters. The collective knowledge and memories produced by the formation of short and long term communities worths to be protected and published. This way, counter-narratives become alternative arguments to the current hegemonic conditions.
There is a need for tools, methods and infrastructures to ensure that data, projects and memory of collectives, such as feminist groups are properly accessible, preserved and managed.
Why?

1. We have seen feminist and activist work being deleted from the Internet, censored, and/or prevented from being seen, heard or read.
2. Gender-based online violence in the form of trolling and hateful machoists harassing feminists/activists online and offline.