Revenge of the Female Nerds: Myth Busting

View A Video of Annalee Busting The Take Off Your Glasses Myth

Last night, I attended a fabulous talk by Annalee Newitz, contributing editor of Wired, on the topic of "Revenge of the Female Nerds:  Busting media and industry myths  about why women can't be technical."   The lecture took place at Harvard Law School, and what follows is my liveblogging of that lecture.

The room was probably 60-70% women, by the way - which goes along with her main idea that this is a gender issue, and that men and women need to work together on solving it.

She began with a couple of anecdotes.   She attended Defcon, a major Hacker convention in Las Vegas. "Every time I was introduced, I was asked whose girlfriend are you?  A woman at a conference like this wouldn't be interested in the subject matter...  Both men and women asked."   She also described a session where a male presenter said, "There are no women hackers."  Despite the fact that many were in the room.  The speaker continued to describe his unsuccessful attempt to identify women hackers, and therefore he asserted there were none.   As he spoke, women starting leaving the room.  By the end of his talk, there were no women  hackers in the room."

Her assumptions:

• Gender  inequality is a social problem for both women and men to solve
• Larry Summers is wrong (There is no conclusive research that women's brains are different)
• Historical statistics aren't particularly helpful
• Women in high tech and the sciences exist, thank you very much.

She cited statistics from National Science Foundation Studies

In 1985,  36% of bachelors degrees in CS by women.
In 1995,  28% of bachelors degrees in CS by women.
In 2001,  27% of bachelors degrees in CS by women. 

What does this mean?  That women should behave in way that is more feminine (that is, they don’t play with machines)?  Are women less interested in technology/science?  Another way to look at the numbers, it seems like there are cultural forces at work that are pushing women out of taking jobs in the sciences or that woman have internalized.

However, if you look at long-term from 1966 to 2001: engineering degrees went  from 0% to 21% in 2001.  There is a generation of people educating the next generation. It doesn't happen fast, but is growing.

We need to be asking:   How do we make the future safe for female geeks?

We need more Grace Hoppers and fewer Martha Stewarts!  (Hopper invented the compiler.) (My fellow blogher, Lisa Williams, disagreed on this point.  She feels we need to value "women's work.")

Annalee Newitz said, "We need to look carefully at the women who are participating in science and technology. Look at the social and cultural myths that are holding women back. We need to question fantasies and myths about science and women. How are those myths holding women back?"

Myth 1:
Women aren't interested in technology

She showed some examples of female geeks, from Ada Lovelace in the early 19th century to a group of female robot designers.  Look, there are plenty of examples of women interested in technology.

Myth 2:
Smart women (geeks)  aren't pretty - and women should  be pretty

This myth claims that you have to be unattractive and wear glasses to be a geek.  And pretty girls don’t code because they'd rather be ice skating, dating boys, etc. How does a brainy girl become a "real girl", and have the same experiences as other girls? Answer (according to this myth): The girl takes off her glasses.   If she wants to be successful and pretty (and have sex!), this myth requires her to take off her glasses.

That's bullshit.

Society is giving women a false choice:  Either keep the glasses on and do the technical work, or take the glasses off and have a dating life.

She went on to explain that the principle way people get ahead in sciences is through mentoring. If men dominate, your mentors will be male.  There is anxiety about an older man mentoring a younger woman. (They can always take off their glasses!) The concern is that he is just mentoring her because she is judged a "cutie." That struggle doesn’t exist between two (heterosexual) men, allegedly.

Myth 3
Women would rather stay up all night with babies than stay up all night in the lab.

The myth of "family responsibilities" keeps women from working in science and technology.  It's propaganda and it's working.   Society is saying that if you have kids, you can't work. No real reason. Look at the propaganda. Why can't they bring their babies to the computer lab?

"Raising children isn't a special job, it just takes planning?" [I wonder if Annalee has kids?  Even if you have a balance with your spouse and childcare options, it is hard to balance both demanding work and demanding children. - Beth]   Women are given a false choice: either a job or raising kids.

These myths are ones that women have internalized and are imposing upon themselves, in addition to society constantly imposing these myths upon women.

She suggested that we "propagate memes" - as she called to the bloghers in the room - go forth and propogate memes! 

Female nerds need to organize.  She then gave these examples:

DorkBot
Linux Chix
University groups for women engineers
MentorNet.net
Blogher
(Deborah Finn told her to add Boston TechnoBabes to the list after the talk ...)

These are "female dominated groups, but men can join."

Geeks fight for the future! -- Know the basic myths that are holding people back and informing their opinions of themselves and each other. Myth busting. Men and women are allies in this - women don't need to do it alone. In order to change, both genders need to work together.

Technorati Tags: blogher, webjustice2.0, net2, nptech, berkman
feministcarnival

Comments

[Deirdre' Straughan]

It's very possible that women's brains are different from men's. (I can intuit many evolutionary reasons why that could be so.) That doesn't mean that women can't or don't want to learn technical stuff, but it might mean that they learn it differently. If that is the case (and it's a question that merits serious study, not knee-jerk PC backlash), we should be looking at how technical courses are *taught*.

The notion of "learning differences" among school kids is well accepted now, with the corollary that different learning styles means a need for different teaching styles, so that everyone has the best opportunity to do well with the brain they've got. That there could also be differences in male and female learning styles seems logical to me. Ergo, technical courses taught by men for men may not play to the learning strengths of many women.

The geek life/work style may also be an issue. Expectations of programmers and engineers in professional life are incompatible with the other choices women may make, e.g. to have children. You're not going to be the person staying at your desk til 3 am to complete an important project if you've got to go home and get dinner on the table for your kids. Sure, it'd be nice to have a spouse who is willing to share the burden (I've been lucky in that regard), but not everyone does, and who in their right mind would say "The kids can starve, I've got this project to finish." ?

[Beth]

Deirdre:

Thank you for your thoughtful comments! They've helped me crystalize my own in regards to the takeaways for frm the talk.

In fairness, and I checked my notes - she did say there was no conclusive research either way -- so that Summers couldn't make his case (Women aren't interested in science and tech and that's why there are less of them in academia) based on biology.

As an aside, there was a book recently about how motherhood makes us smarter ...
http://www.time.com/time/connections/printout/0,8816,1053659,00.html

I totally agree with your thoughts about the lifestyle. When Analee said, you can have kids and be a female nerd too, it just takes planning ... I wondered if she had kids?
I work and parent - I don't work the long crazy hours I used to do before kids for the reasons you mention. AND, I, too, have a wonderful husband who pitches in 50%! (And sometimes more). Kids take attention, caring, and nuturing and most times the geek lifestyle demands 100% of your attention.

[Brad Webb]

Wow, great post, Beth. I do agree, though, that this is a shared societal issue. I'll take it from a different tact, though.

Guys would benefit just as much from Women being accepted into geekdom as full and equal partners/peers.

Why? Well, let's hit up the dating issue. As much as Geek is the new Prep, that still really isn't the case. People who want to fully engulf themselves in the lifestyle are still finding the movies are way, way off-base. So, obviously here, women being peers amongst peers is mutually beneficial. I personally really don't like the exclusionary "clique" that geekdom has become, it rings far too strongly back towards (what I would guess) is a mirrored situation in many geeks' younger years. Why do we always end up becoming what we strive to overcome? Sad, that.

That being said, this is somewhat of an off-colour statement, but smart women *are* sexy/sexier. Too many geeks hit their first financial success and forget what really greases their wheels (brains) and what makes them meld/fit in the society that for so long has held them out.

I say More Tech Girls. Oh, and introduce them to me, please. :)

[anina.net]

hi beth! i wondered if you saw my interview on www.nerdtv.net and what you thought?

[Beth]

Anina:

Wow, I loved the interview -- particularly the bit about all the application development and the lies to tell your phone company.

You really bust the myth!

http://beth.typepad.com/beths_blog/2005/11/female_nerd_myt.html

[Kim]

Psst - it's "Defcon", not "Deathcon". :-)

http://www.defcon.org/

[Beth]

Kim,

Thanks for the correction. I corrected it!

[inky circus]

This is a great post and I am glad to see it. True public understanding of the girl geek has a long way to go. Of course we aren't all unattractive - any more than all male firefighters are hot. One of my best friends could be a bloody model (5'11" slim and gorgeous) but she is finishing off her Ph.D in organic chemistry instead.

And of course women are interested in technology - it can be useful (cell phones) fun (iPod) and empowering (solar panels). But it is possible that women and men may be interested in different aspects of technology. How it works, versus how it works for me, for example.

But that being said, there ARE MOST DEFINITELY PROVEN differences bewteen the sex's brains. Hundreds and hundreds of research papers have documented differences in the functioning of male versus female brains given different tasks.

What those differences mean in a practical sense is more open to interpretation. Ie - do they explain why there are less women in academia? I don't think anyone could say.

But what I want to know is why that is bad? Men and women are different. This is GOOD.

Girl geeks have a particularly unflattering, unattractive wrap. This is bad. To ensure that the next generation of girls feels cool and confident about a life devoted to Linux, we have to change that. But ignoring the fundamental differences between men and women in NOT the way forward.

[Deirdre' Straughan]

We can start with us girl geeks who have children raising them to appreciate geekiness. My daughter's got it on both sides: her dad's a mathematician, her mom "does computer stuff." So of course she outcools everybody in school, but flashes of geek still shine through... and she doesn't put up with any crap from the boys!

[Deirdre' Straughan]

ps I'm reading Steven Pinker's "The Blank Slate" and he has a great deal to say about the differences in men's and women's brains, lots of research references.

[Abigail Barlow (UK)]

Hi, I was looking onthe internet, for some help with my I.T home work. I was looking for information on Ada Lovelace, and I got your bloggy thing. (excuse the punn) Myth 2. AMAZINGLY EXCELLENT!!! The way you have explained that the modern day woman is portrayed as a nerd or a geek, if she just so happens to know a bit about technical things. Thanks for your help with my I.T home work!

Abigail xx

[tekanji]

I say More Tech Girls. Oh, and introduce them to me, please. :)

I know you meant well, Brad, but please stop! Girls aren't geeky for your (or anyone else's) entertainment. My attractiveness (or lackthereof) has nothing to do with my geekiness, my gamerness, or any other part of my personality. And I am so bloody sick of being seen first and foremost as "hawt" and then secondly as the part of my personality I'm trying to express.

[Organic Chemistry]

The only thing I would like to add to this is that I went to college with Miss New York State 1998, and she was a chemistry major and very good at it from what I understand.

[Primax]

But it shouldn't be a problem if you happen to find a female computer technician beautiful and sweet, as I did during a 6-month stint at a computer shop. We were good friends :)