Gender and Education, 2015
Vol. 27, No. 2, 164–182, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09540253.2015.1008421
Between a rock and a hard place: women and computer
technology
Yannis Pechtelidis*, Yvonne Kosma and Anna Chronaki
Department of Early Childhood Education, University of Thessaly, Volos, Greece
(Received 18 June 2013; accepted 8 January 2015)
This paper explores certain possible reasons behind the uneasy relationship
between women and technology. The cultural identification of technology with
masculinity has been well documented through previous research. However, we
feel it is useful to revisit this complex relationship through the scope of a more
subtle distinction between ‘users’ and ‘connoisseurs’, and the struggle over
power, which revolves around a specific form of hegemonic masculinity. We
draw on interviews that examine students’ experiences, emotions, and statements
about gender, technology, mathematics, and education, and we try to offer an
understanding of the ways women negotiate their position within the dominant
discourse about computing and mathematics. Our analysis employs poststructuralist discourse theory.
Keywords: gender; computer technology; subjectivity; discourse; education; geeks
Introduction
According to the popular movie site IMDb, the 1984 film Electric Dreams (Steve
Barron) is about an artificially intelligent PC and its human owner, who are in romantic
rivalry over a woman.1 Those few lines are enough to illustrate the dominant cultural
stereotypes about the uneasy relationship between women and technology. Not only is
‘human’ identified as inherently male, but there is also a clear metonymical relation
between masculinity and technology. ‘Woman’ is, once again, both the object and
prize; moreover, she functions as the signifier of difference, as opposed to both man
and computer. Today this film seems widely outdated, but unfortunately gendered
stereotypes about computing are not. On the contrary, they seem to be rather persistent
considering several statements made by the undergraduate students we interviewed for
our study, who were barely born at the time the film was released. By analysing their
narratives in this paper, we attempt to illustrate the subtle interconnections between
gender and computer technology. Although the exploration of this theme is not new
(see Weitzenbaum 1976; Turkle 1984), and a lot of attention has been paid to the
under-representation of women in the field of technology ever since (Cohoon and
Aspray 2008), we were intrigued by the way our female subjects strategically conformed to the dominant gender order, so as to serve personal needs, and to compromise
contrasting subject positions.
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
© 2015 Taylor & Francis
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The participants in our research were all undergraduate students at the School of
Engineering (University of Thessaly) located in Volos – a middle-sized town in
Greece – studying either computing or architecture. In both departments, digital technology played an important role. The fact that they were all actively involved in technology not only allowed them to distinguish between computer buffs and amateurs, but
there was also a clear hierarchy amongst those who claimed ‘connoisseurship’. In this
framework we assert that gender–power relations largely shape the hierarchical classification of subjects within the dominant discourse about technology. Nevertheless, this
suggests a far from clear-cut situation and entails aspects that go beyond the provision
of and access to technology (Abbiss 2011, 602). For example, the continuous presence
of computers and gadgets in everyday life that provide an increasingly friendlier interface, as well as the way communication has changed through the extended use of digital
social networks, has caused the mitigation of gender distinctions in preferences concerning certain information technology services, such as the use of the Internet and
email (Volman and van Eck 2001; Colley and Comber 2003; Barker and Aspray
2008). There is evidence, however, of a sustained gender gap in attitudes, involvement,
and engagement with computer technology despite the ubiquity of computers in everyday life and schooling (Durndell, Glissov, and Siann 1995; American Association of
University Women Educational Foundation Commission on Technology and
Teacher Education 2000; Colley and Comber 2003; Charles and Bradley 2008;
Abbiss 2011).
Technology and the handling of machines have been historically constituted as
masculine competences in patriarchal culture. Even amongst female students involved
in computing and programming, ‘gender relations were defined in part through a link
between technology and gender identity, and particularly between technological competence and masculinity’ (Abbiss 2011, 602). Computing is, therefore, not a neutral
practice; rather it embodies and influences social relations, including gender relations
(Wajcman 1991; Christie 1997; Charles and Bradley 2008; Abbiss 2011). Connell
uses Gramsci’s (1971) concept of hegemony to analyse the relationships in society’s
gender order; through this process ‘a hegemony of masculinity is established by the
domination of one masculinity over another’ (Haywood and Mac an Ghaill 2003).
Hegemonic masculinity is, thus, a superior position, which is constituted in relation
to other masculinities and to femininities through the structure of gender relations
(Connell 1995). Systematic involvement in computing is correlated with the construction of such hegemonic masculinities and gendered hierarchies. Through the construction of a masculine culture around computers in schools and elsewhere, female
involvement in computing is largely discouraged (Clegg 2001; Jenson, de Castell,
and Bryson 2003; Jenson and Rose 2003; Varma, Prasad, and Kapur 2008). This
gender order is reinforced by the influence of the bio-political ideal of motherhood
in women’s occupational preferences. Hence, even those who do choose computing
professionally tend to reject a career in software engineering; instead, they opt for
a more gendered line of work, such as educational technology. However, and this
is probably the most interesting point in our findings, they do so not because they
are duped by dominant ideology, but because they choose to strategically adapt
to given gender norms; being fully aware of their subordinated position in a
male-dominated field, they find that this way it is easier to meet social expectations
(Chronaki 2011). Such self-exclusion, however, cannot be interpreted by merely
analysing male and female students’ participation patterns. For this reason we
focus on the personal narratives of their lived experiences with technology, and
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their constructions of gender identities as users and producers of digital technology
tools (Abbiss 2011, 602).
Specifically, we agree with Gill (2008, 433) who claims that the focus on subjectivity ‘is relatively underexplored, with the exception of a few groundbreaking and important studies’, and that:
[t]here is very little understanding of how discourses relate to subjectivity, identity or
lived embodied experiences of selfhood. We know almost nothing about how the
social or cultural ‘gets inside’, and transforms and reshapes our relations to ourselves
and others.
In this sense, our study differs significantly in scope from quantitative approaches in
starting point, method, and conclusion. We are neither interested in examining a representative sample, nor do we claim that our findings are applicable to the entire population; rather, we focus on just a few cases (although the total of the interviews we
conducted were about 15 and were all part of a larger research programme), which
we analyse in depth. This way, we attempt to achieve a better understanding of
people, to gain knowledge about similar groups, and to show how through the
process of communication ‘reality is produced, maintained, and transformed’ (Carey
1989, 23). Our approach assumes that subjectivity is fabricated and woven discursively
in multiple sociopolitical contexts; it emphasises the significance of hegemonic and
marginal discourses, but it also emphasises subjective agency, which is contingent,
multiple, local, fluid, fragile, and emotional (Walshaw 2004; Chronaki and Pechtelidis
2012).
Gender and technology: a post-structural perspective
Our paper draws on the central post-structural feminist position that gender is something that we do; in Butler’s words it is an incessant activity or a performance
(1993). In this sense gender is not something that we simply have, or something that
we are; it is not fixed, nor is it based on an inherent ‘essence’; it is a social construction,
a fiction, and is, therefore, open to change and contestation. Nonetheless, gender categories (such as ‘natural woman’ or ‘real man’) have a regulatory function and
impose normative ideals. Such ideals are socially and culturally instituted, and they
determine how bodies are (or are not) supposed to act. Normative definitions of
gender produce specific subject positions and relations. They are also regulative
because they define the limits of the body and the thinkable range of potential subjective action. They designate which statements, attitudes, practices, and choices are
acceptable and which are not; which are normal and expected (instead of marginal
and wrong); and which are ostracised from the territory of what is culturally, socially,
and politically identified as human. Those regulatory ideals define heterosexual normalcy, and their unity depends upon the repudiation of certain forms of activity and
desire through the rejection of alternative subject positions. In other words, the situating
of subjects within the dominant gender matrix reproduces power relations; it determines
the way in which subjects perceive themselves, and how they relate to each other. This
is not to say that subjects are passively and inescapably constructed by the hegemonic
gender order, but no matter how many levels of consciousness one reaches, gender
always runs deeper than any other social or economic divide. A relevant example
that also applies in our case is that the normative ideal of ‘masculinity’ is partially
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constructed around the cultural belief that, men are rational, good at math, and techsavvy, and women are not (Mendick and Moreau 2012).
Drawing on post-structuralism our aim is to oppose essentialist approaches; instead,
we claim that both gender and technology are discursive formations. However, the term
‘discourse’ is perceived in a variety of ways in academia. In our paper we employ Foucault, who uses the term to describe systems of heterogeneous statements produced
within a historical ‘field of discursivity’ (Laclau and Mouffe 1985). In Foucault’s
view, discourses consist of objects, places of speaking, concepts, and themes or theories
(Foucault 2002). The correlation of those elements forms a particular ‘discursive
regime’ that accounts for whatever is taken to be the ‘truth’ at a certain time and
place. Nevertheless, the production of ‘truth’ is never neutral; it produces hierarchies
between those who know, and those who do not know; those who are considered
capable, and those who are not. Discourses about technology as a form of knowledge
play an important role in the reproduction of the ‘regime of truth’ in our society. It is
through the articulation with hegemonic beliefs about gender that they produce specific
forms of subjectivity. Gendered subjects are, therefore, positioned within a specific
field of power relations (Butler 1992) that emerges through the discursive articulation
of gender and technology. In our case study, however, the crude distinction between
knowing or not has proved insufficient. As we have stated above, all the subjects in
our research, both male and female, were competent and happy to use computer technology, and hence the division of subjects around knowledge was produced on a deeper
level; it was a much more subtle division that was based on varying nuances of
knowledge.
From this viewpoint, the decision to actively engage with technology becomes a
significant way to perform gender and to confirm (or challenge) dominant gender categories (Butler 1990). Performing technology is, at least stereotypically, a way of performing a hegemonic masculinity. According to Connell (1995, 71), masculinity is a
‘topos’ in the field of gender relations and social practices where men and women
belong and interact. Masculinity, thus, emerges as the outcome of those practices on
the subjects’ embodied identity. Moreover, she stresses that concepts such as ‘malecentricity’, ‘masculine’, and ‘masculinity’ are particularly opaque, as well as fluid
terms. Such an approach prompts us to grasp masculinity not as a fixed category but
as part of a system that produces gender relations, and encourages us to wonder
what it is that makes technology a male business.
If we were to summarise the prevalent approaches on gender and technology, we
would distinguish on one hand the liberal discourses on equal opportunity that focus
on women’s agency in their vocational choices, and on the other the structural
approaches that emphasise the reproduction of gendered power relations and the exclusion of women from technological spheres of work (Henwood 1998a, 36). However,
neither of those polarised discourses can fully account for the complicated positioning
of women or provide an understanding of their lived experience with technology. For
this reason, we argue for an approach that provides a bridge between the individual and
the structural levels.
Moreover, although we argue from within a post-structural framework, there are
some ideas found in our paper, notably ‘patriarchy’, which we borrow from a radical
feminist framework. Some readers may feel that this creates a theoretical tension, as
many feminists contend that the concept of patriarchy necessarily presupposes the stability of gender identities (as it describes a general structure in which men have power
over women). However, it is not necessary to view ‘woman’ as a coherent identity
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in order to acknowledge issues of social injustice and exclusion, or to ground the possibility of women uniting as women ‘in order to formulate and pursue specific feminist
aims’ (Mouffe 1987, 76). To accept that every social agent ‘is constituted by an ensemble of “subject positions” that can never be totally fixed’, and to ‘deny the existence of
an a priori, necessary link between subject positions, does not mean that there are no
constant efforts to establish between them historical, contingent and variable links’
(Mouffe 1987, 77–78). One such articulation, we believe, is ‘patriarchy’, not in the
form of a system of fixed subject positions, but as a discursive structure where
sexual difference is a site of power relations and struggle. This approach, we feel,
might work towards resolving the problem of reductionism and negation of female
agency often found in the direct implementation of patriarchy theory.
In our paper, we employ discourse theory (Laclau and Mouffe 1985; Foucault 2002)
to analyse students’ narratives about technology. Through their statements, the students
in our research occupy particular subject positions, which draw from specific discourses
and social practices. This way subjects contribute to the hegemonic process of engendering. However, due to the contingent and controversial nature of performativity, the
embodiment of the normative gender order is neither seamless nor predetermined. Not
all females are deterred by symbolically masculine disciplines, and not all males are
encouraged (Hughes 2001, 276). The recognition that subjects are not passively situated in a given gender order, but actively negotiate subject positions within discursive
constraints, points towards examining to what extent the students in our research
conform to hegemonic patriarchy, and to what degree they resist. In our analysis, we
employ the concept of performative embodiment (Butler 1992) to stress that engendering is both an act of convention/compliance and a means of resistance/fissure. In particular, we examine the ways in which students comply with or break away from the
restrictions of normative heterosexual masculine/feminine dualism, which is a fundamental aspect in the definition of human subjectivity and the arrangement of the
social field.
The research
Our analysis draws on empirical data collected as part of a broader research project
focusing on Mathematics, Technology, and Gender, which was carried out in 2006–
2007. During the project we conducted interviews, which intended to trace the students’
experiences and emotions about the interrelation between gender, technology, mathematics, and education. The interviews were semi-structured and lasted 25–90
minutes. We preferred this approach, because we wanted to encourage our subjects
to freely express their thoughts, feelings, and fears. Initially we conducted interviews
with 15 students, and we identified certain general attitudes and questions regarding
gender and technology. After a first analysis of the material, we detected a pattern;
all 15 interviewees reproduced the distinction between users and connoisseurs. This
pattern was particularly evident in five of the interviews; so we decided to do
follow-up interviews with these students, in order to conduct further in-depth analysis.
The interviewees we focused upon were two male (Dinos and Anestis) and three female
students (Niki, Rena, and Kyriaki) from the School of Engineering, at the University of
Thessaly, who were all Greek; white; middle-class; and came from urban areas. Finally,
we briefly revisited those specific subjects several years later, to see whether their attitudes at the time of the initial interviews reflected in their present careers. Did they illustrate a shift in attitude? Did they conform to the dominant gender order, or not? Did any
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of our female subjects choose a career in a male-dominated field, or did they all opt for
more gendered professions?
For readers to be able to contextualise our findings, we feel we should provide some
cultural references. In Greece, students who wish to be admitted to university need to
take national entrance examinations after high school. This means that admission to
university is highly dependent on school performance, which also accounts for the composition of the student body at the various departments. Greece is one of the European
countries with no fees for tertiary education. Theoretically, the absence of tuition fees
should provide equal access to university, but practically students from more affluent
backgrounds have access to better preparatory courses, and subsequently better
chances of being admitted to one of the more distinguished schools. The School of
Engineering is generally considered to be an esteemed institution.
Although we are mainly concerned with the way women position themselves within
the computer technology discourse, we use the statements of our male interviewees to
illustrate how subject positions are constructed through the discourses of gender and
technology. Instead of accepting the simple correlation between gender and specific
subject positions in the field of technology, we agree that ‘particular forms of femininity
are produced in relation to and through particular, and highly valued, forms of masculinity’ (Blaise 2009, 453). From this premise, we attest that ‘cutting masculinity loose
from its ontological premise within physiology, it is possible to envisage a more fluid
embodiment of masculinities and femininities’ (Haywood and Mac an Ghail 2012, 4).
This position allows us a more subtle explanation of the contradictions found in our
subjects’ statements.
At the time, our subjects Dinos, Anestis, and Niki studied architecture, whilst Rena
and Kiriaki were enrolled in informatics. Digital technology played an important role in
their lives, and they were all competent in maths. However, they seemed to construct
quite different subject positions in relation to computing and mathematics. Whereas
they seemed to conform to hegemonic gender binaries, their narratives revealed ambiguities and inconsistencies in their identity work. Mostly they consented to the dominant discourse, but at times they would challenge those structures, and define
themselves and the world around them in alternative ways.
To make sense of this, subjectivities are understood as constituted through a
complex interconnection of discourses. Discourse analysis allows us to trace ‘not
merely people’s assumptions, ideas and definitions expressed through language but
also the practices, formations and subject positions which follow from these’
(Henwood 1998b, 39). This approach permits us to analyse the discursive process of
subject formation by identifying dominant and marginal discourses; it also allows us
to get in touch with the subjects’ lived experiences, feelings, and ideas. Such individual
perceptions play a central role in the organisation of everyday social life, where gender
and technology are significant components. Furthermore, it challenges the idea that a
discourse is produced individually; instead ‘we must conceive discourse as a series
of discontinuous segments, whose tactical function is neither uniform nor stable’ (Foucault 1979, 100–101). Finally, it shifts theoretical interest towards contemporary forms
of exercising power.
Boys and girls in cyberville
For our research we discussed with several students from different departments at the
School of Engineering. At first glance they all seemed so familiar with digital
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technology that one might get the impression that technology is not related to issues of
gender and power at all. Irrespective of gender, they stated that digital technology was
very important to them, and that they invested a lot of time in it, either for work or for
entertainment. Α closer look, however, disclosed the imperceptible but extremely
powerful correlation between technology and gender. The analysis revealed that technology is far from gender neutral; not only is there a clear distinction between those
who possess computer knowledge and those who do not; but there is also a rigid hierarchy amongst those who share this form of knowledge, which is clearly gendered. The
systematic use of technology is, at least partly, linked to a certain hegemonic masculinity and the reproduction of the dominant gender order. Interestingly, this gendered perception of technology was reproduced in the statements of all the students we
interviewed. Mostly it was evident in the divide the students made between true connoisseurship, and the simple use of technology.
At the time Dinos was in his final year at the School of Architecture and belonged to
a small, exclusively male group of students at the department known for their computer
skills, who identified themselves as ‘geeks’:
Q. Does using computers make you feel special?
D. I think that all my friends, and everybody I know, have a similar relationship
to technology; some do better than others. [...] even those who aren’t that
savvy are definitely into computing [...] Anestis (a leading figure in the
group) believes that there are those who really understand technology,
and those who merely use it. I proposed that we taught the others how to
use certain programs; to show them that it’s quite easy, really. Anestis, on
the other hand, claims that it is not enough for people to know how to
use the software; he believes it is important that they understand how it
works. [...] Otherwise, each time there is a system upgrade people won’t
have a clue. [...] they don’t even consider how much math and technology
is behind each command [...] They need to understand that pressing a button
translates into a command, and the command translates into a process that...
Dinos perceives technology through the binary comprehending/using; this way he
produces a clear hierarchy between the two terms, implying that ‘geeks’ are superior.
Subsequently, the subject position of ‘geek’ is strongly related to power and agency.
This resonates with Mendick and Francis’ (2012) claim that the subject position of
geek is privileged. So, although Dinos typically denies the distinction by favouring collaboration and rejecting competitiveness (although students at his department are very
competitive – a culture that Dinos tries to resist and oppose) his perception remains
essentially hierarchical. This becomes evident from his statements, since he identifies
technology with mathematics:
D. Whether you like or not, technology is mathematics; you can’t separate the
two. It is unacceptable that there wasn’t a single math course in the curriculum. [...] I think that the argument that you don’t need to learn mathematics
because the p.c. can do the work for you, is essentially wrong […] (T)o use
a machine is one thing, but to understand the process is something completely different. Using is not the same as comprehending. [...] It is very important to understand the crucial role mathematics play in our lives. Basically,
mathematics rule the world (laughter); [...] everything is zero and one …
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Dinos believes that mathematics is essential for mastering technology. By technology, here, he implies programming. Although the grounds of his argument are pragmatic, eventually he idealises mathematics. This becomes evident when he argues that
everything can be reduced to sequences of binary digits (the binary numeral system
that represents numeric values using two symbols: 0 and 1). Dinos categorises
people according to whether they possess mathematical knowledge or not, which
he considers as the organisational basis of social life; this way he positions this particular form of knowledge at the top of the academic spectrum (see also Walkerdine
1988). In a way, Dinos is right to recognise the obsession with numbers that is typical
of modern societies. The use of hard stats is seen as a guarantee of rigour and diligence. This preoccupation is promoted by various dominant discourses, and it commonly leads to the reduction of merely every aspect of social life to mathematical
forms.
However, Dinos never questions this status quo, or the power relations that originate from it, exactly as most of the male undergraduates we interviewed for our
research project. All were very protective of the sense of specialness they got from
‘technological ability’ and ‘mathematical skill’, and they tended to perceive the discourse about technology and mathematics as natural. However, this is all a distraction
from recognising the elephant in the room: a naturalised discourse justifies the status
quo, and serves the interests of the dominant at the expense of the interests of the subordinate. This made it very difficult for them to see that their special ability is socially
constructed. Our finding resonates perfectly with Mendick and Francis’ (2012) argument that geeks connect strongly to mathematics, science, and technology (see also
Varma 2007). Furthermore, Dinos never considered the gendered pattern of participation in mathematics; that doing mathematics is a way of doing masculinity, which
obviously introduces more tensions for girls and women, than for boys and men
(Mendick 2006). To excel at mathematics:
involves taking up upon oneself and claiming as part of one’s identity a number of aspects
of masculinity: mastery and the celebration of it; control over the world; a reveling in
abstraction; and the triumph of reason over emotion. Doing mathematics, enjoying or
being good at it, is therefore discursively constructed as doing masculinity. (Mendick
2006; Paechter 2007, 119)
Hence, when Dinos repeatedly refers to the need to understand technology through
mathematics, he does not wonder whether mathematics education as we know it
raises any questions about the meaning of mathematics and technology, which is
both relative and socially constructed. In this framework, it is important to note that
all the things Dinos does not take into account should be read as something that is
absent from what he says, instead of something he does not say. In other words,
what is being silenced needs to be seen as evidence of a social patterning, since this
is the problem, rather than an individual failing.
Niki, a female architecture student, adopts a quite different position regarding the
relationship between technology and mathematics. Niki claims that she likes mathematics, and that she was good at it when she was at school. However, she thinks that mathematics is neither necessary for her studies nor directly related to technology. In
addition, she never considers mathematics as being important to her everyday life.
Nevertheless, Niki also perceives the relation of mathematics to technology through
the using/comprehending binary; a perception that is also inherently gendered:
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Q.
N.
Q.
N.
Q.
N.
Q.
N.
[...] Do you think men use technology differently?
Eh, yes.
In what way?
Men use it more.
Why?
I have no idea … (Laughter)
Is this something you suppose, or something you have actually witnessed?
I see it. Most girls I know might watch a video or edit a couple of photographs, that kind of stuff. Boys will search for the best hardware, constantly
configure their settings, browse endlessly to find stuff to download and so
on.
Q. Are you in any way different from the others at school? Do you think you’re
exceptional?
N. No, I’ m like the other girls, I don’t really look for anything more. [...]
Although I might spend all day [...] in front of the p.c. [...] About the
thing we discussed with Anestis the other day: he asked whether I preferred
to keep learning new stuff on the p.c., or if I’d rather learn one thing well and
use it to do things. Well, I said I preferred the latter, while he said that he
wanted to keep on learning things. I suppose that’s the way it goes, I
don’t know.
Although Niki claims that she is one of these students who use computers a lot, and
spends hours in front of the screen – probably as many hours as Dinos, Anestis, and the
other ‘geeks’ – she does not consider herself to be any different from the rest of her
female peers at school, at least not essentially. In their statements, not only Niki, but
also Dinos and the other interviewees, imply that there is a hierarchical classification
amongst the students, depending on the time they spend on computers; according to
this taxonomy, ‘geeks’ are at the top of the scale; they enjoy status and recognition
at school, and they also seem rather intimidating to others, which must be seen from
the perspective that ‘geekness’ is highly gendered – for example, when we asked
Anestis whether there were any female ‘geeks’ amongst them he replied, ‘No! If
there were, we would definitely marry them.’
In this context, Niki accepts the binary perception of technology described above,
and she positions herself on the subordinate feminised side of using computers, instead
of exploring, evolving, and creating something new. Afterwards, however, she challenges the uncontested status of the ‘techies’, and she partly distances herself from
the majority of her fellow students by constructing a discrete and empowering
subject position for herself, neither as geek nor as amateur:
N. [...] As far as I can tell, those who invest most of their time in computers,
hardly spend any time communicating with other people. [...] I am somewhere in between.
Q. What do you mean?
N. Anestis, for example, is an extreme case...
Q. In what sense?
N. We could say that he’s the school’s ‘alpha-geek’. There are only a few who
dare to talk to him. I was pretty intimidated by him at first, [...] he can be
very arrogant, like, ‘I know all this stuff about computers.... and everybody
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who doesn’t is ignorant’. And this is a problem, you see. Me, I don’t know, I
suppose I’m somewhere in between.
Once again we see that Niki classifies people according to the time they spend on
computers, but this time she adds a twist: on one hand there are the people who ‘invest
more time (than her) in computers’ but are socially inept, and on the other those who
possess social skills but lack computer knowledge and dexterity. Niki, however, situates herself strategically in relation to this classification, and occupies a position ‘in
between’. This way, she discursively constructs the ‘geeks’ as antisocial, weird, and
generally speaking as excessive and not normal (like her), and the others as normal
but unexceptional. She simultaneously keeps a safe distance from the ‘geeks’ and
the rest of the students, and so she implies that she is both normal and better, reserving
a powerful status for herself.
The comprehending/using binary is in line with the distinction the interviewees
make between different subject positions: the ‘programmer’, who is held to possess
algorithmic thinking and is passionate about computers, and the plain ‘user’, that is
everybody else, who just uses computers as tools. According to Rena, as well as
most of the people we interviewed, the programmer is considered the quintessential
professional in information technology, and is usually male:
R. I think that most female students aren’t interested in programming.
Q. Why?
R. Eh, I think that programming is a way of thinking; either you have it, or you
don’t. What I mean is that you need algorithmic thinking; and, even so,
writing code isn’t very entertaining.
Q. So, you think that certain female students lack algorithmic thinking?
R. Yes, either they haven’t developed it enough, or they just don’t have it. But
neither do I think that all male students have it. It’s just that I often find
writing code cumbersome; and I’m mostly just relieved when I’m done,
and the program is running. It’s not really a pleasant job to look for errors
and to debug a code. Most students just want to make their lives easier by
avoiding to do any programming. [...]
Q. Do you think there is a gender related difference in performance?
R. No, I think it’s just a matter of determination and time investment; and
maybe those guys who have a particular passion for science dedicate
more time than …
Q. So you think that males are more determined, then?
R. Not all … but … .
Q. Some.
R. Yes.
Q. So you’re saying that female students aren’t as determined?
R. They are, but to a smaller degree.
Q. Why is that?
R. Ah, I won’t go as far as to say that guys are kind of dull (laughter), but I do
think it’s clearly a matter of how passionate you are about what you do.
Maybe girls have broader interests. That’s why guys are perhaps more conscious about their choice to study IT than girls.
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There were certain issues that came up during these discussions: Why are boys
usually more interested in computers than girls? Why is it that many girls who are interested in computers do not want to admit it? Although the formulation of those questions
seems perfectly ‘natural’, we believe that things are not quite as they seem. It may be
true that all the ‘geeks’ in the group we interviewed for our study were boys, and that
‘geekness’ seems to be a mostly male attribute in general. However, there are two
important aspects that need to be considered.
The first issue is that the way those questions are formulated (which in turn reflects
dominant beliefs about the relation between gender and technology) always already
accepts that female ‘geeks’ are an exception; and they never take into account all
those males who are not into computing at all. This means that the point may be
valid in the realm of the ‘connoisseurs’, but it is not necessarily so when considering
‘ordinary’ users. It is never put to question that many males are technologically
inept. Within the dominant discursive regime it is simply accepted that technology is
a male domain, so it is always that female ‘otherness’ which is presented as unable
to fit in; male ineptness on the other hand is at no time an issue, and if it does come
up, it is simply considered as a matter of choice. Thus, we claim that the gender gap
in technology, rather than simply reflect real gender-specific differences, is, in many
cases, discursively reinforced.
If, then, the gender gap in technology is to an important extent a discursive construction, why are there still relatively few female ‘geeks’ around? An interesting
point of departure is a comment by Niki, an argument which was generally taken up
by most of the students we interviewed:
Q. What distinguishes those who actively engage with technology?
N. I think it’s that they do not mind sitting in front of their screen for hours.
What transpires from the students’ statements is that ‘geeks’ are willing to invest
much more time on computers than everybody else, which requires disciplining their
bodies in specific ways; they remain seated in front of a screen, not casually browsing
the web or interacting on social networks, but focussing on an arduous and time-consuming task. So, it is again the distinction between connoisseurs and plain users. This
notion, however, leads to a new set of questions: Why are ‘geeks’ more receptive to this
form of discipline? Why do they subject their bodies to such a strenuous process? And
finally, why are they usually male?
Where are all the girl geeks?
A recurring element in our interviews was the special status that distinguished connoisseurs from plain users. ‘Geeks’ were endowed with a certain prestige, in which they
clearly took pleasure; and ‘users’ willingly recognised their own inferiority. The
‘geeks’ narcissistic pleasure is, hence, motivated by a feeling of supremacy and
control that stems from possessing a specific form of power/knowledge. Yet, if connoisseurship warrants such status and esteem, why do not women use it to improve their
social stature? The desires to manifest mastery and omnipotence are dominant values
within patriarchal discourse. The problem is that in patriarchy those values are considered inextricably male. Power, expertise, and mastery in a woman are either met
with distaste, or linked with a ‘masculine’ identity. This is not to say that there are
no women who are highly professional or skilled in their field, but that this expertise
Gender and Education
175
is neutralised by being correlated with masculinity. Those women are seen either as
experts, or as women, meaning that femininity and mastery (especially in male-dominated fields) are perceived as irreconcilable. Therefore, there is no available subject
position for the female ‘geek’; she may exist, of course, but only if she is willing to
compromise her ‘female’ identity. Living on a borrowed identity she is rarely seen
as an equal. Also, she will never be warranted the same status and esteem, because
in either case she is a phoney; a copycat, or a ‘body’ masking as a ‘mind’.
The latter argument obviously echoes the Cartesian division of mind and body; far
from being gender-neutral, this binary insists upon reason as disembodied and inherently male, as opposed to the materiality of the female body. Although feminism has
won many battles in the struggle against the grand-narratives of Western Enlightenment
and modernity, this division is still very much alive in the discourse on science and
technology. For example, in modern societies there is a clear trend towards essentialising information. Information is considered as separate from the body, which means it is
seen as distinct, and more important than materiality. Informatics and biomedicine
further feed this social imaginary by representing the human genome in form of
digital code, which creates the myth that human life and reality is a text that can be
simply decoded just as the producers of Star Trek imagined that the body can be
simply dematerialised into an informational pattern and rematerialised, unchanged, at
a remote location (Hayles 1999, 1). In this framework, Dinos’ claim that everything
translates into 0 and 1 is rather telling. This perception explains the status and authority
attributed to information technology. Being a particularly significant source of power,
technology emerges as a terrain for the construction of various masculinities that
compete for hegemony, not only in this specific social field, but also generally. What
Kiriaki says is characteristic:
K. Male students often refer to ‘male antagonism’; it’s always about who’s
going to win [...] (E)very time I was in a team project with male peers
and suggested that we asked another team for help I was told, ‘You
should go ask them; you’re a woman’. [...] What they meant was that a
man is more likely to help a woman because he doesn’t register her as competitor. If the person asking were a man, they would feel the need to protect
their own territory... (Laughter).
It is clear then, at least from a feminist point of view, that prevailing technoeuphoria is curbed by the recognition that techno-science is undeniably gendered;
moreover, it is a field of antagonism and masculine domination. Dinos’ claim is typical:
D. [...] (A)t a modern architect’s office posts are more or less standard; you’ll
have the designer, the creative mind etc. And it’s not incidental that nine out
of ten offices hire women to fill a designer’s position. The designer is like a
secretary. It would be kind of weird to hire a man as a designer.
What is even more important for our argument is how Dinos’ statement reproduces
the same user-connoisseur binary and its gendered connotations mentioned above.
Technology is set up as something that has always been masculine – which evidently
transpires from Dinos’ statements. However, it is important to note that several writers
have already offered evidence that complicates this claim, which ties in with the userconnoisseur binary we build upon in our paper (Spender 1996).
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Y. Pechtelidis et al.
Another related aspect that emerged from our interviews is that most of the students
tended to associate digital technology with freedom. However, they did not take into
account the serious limitations posed by social differences. Notwithstanding the potential offered by computers, such an approach does not consider that technology is a
mixed bag; its social consequences and effects depend on the context it is used in.
Unconditional techno-euphoria usually fails to take into account material conditions,
and literature on cyber culture in some cases tends to ignore the real experiences of
women (Wajcman 2004). According to our interviewees, the PC and the web are generally used for leisure, work, and communication. This may be practical and entertaining, but hardly subversive or liberating (Wajcman 2004):
K. I’ve owned a p.c. since 11th grade, but I never used it for anything else
besides connecting to the Internet, and listening to music.
Therefore, although technology is a field where women could potentially challenge
the given gender order (Hafkin and Huyer 2006), this does not necessarily concern
everyday users, and it hardly makes any sense to generalise the way women experience
and relate to cyber technology.
Working girls: vocational choice in ‘a man’s world’
It is impressive that female students, who are otherwise fully aware of patriarchal
norms, reproduce the dominant gender order through their professional choices.
Kiriaki and Rena claim to possess an algorithmic way of thinking (an essentialist
claim that itself complies with the same rationale as the gender binary); however,
they reject the prospect of becoming programmers or web developers; instead they
opt for professional choices such as working with educational software, thus conforming to dominant gender roles:
Q. [ … ] Have you ever faced any particular difficulties on account of being a
woman?
R. Eh, I think that there are certain gender specific obstacles; I can imagine that
if, in the future, I apply for a job in networks, it is likely that they will hire a
man instead.
Q. Why?
R. I believe that men inspire more confidence; women tend to be associated
with marriage and children; employers think they are likely to take more
days off, and therefore they won’t be as efficient. It’ all about money. [...]
(T)here are problems; especially in finding a job [...] Recently I was considering my future career options. [...] (S)ome of my professors, [..] advised me
that, being a woman, it would perhaps be best to opt for educational
software.2
Q. So, certain people have advised you on this decision?
R. I was already interested in educational software; but I also told them that I
would enjoy network design. And they suggested that I’d rather choose educational software instead of...
Q. But how did they justify their opinion?
R. They said it would be easier for a woman, more pleasant and creative.
Q. And you were told this by male of female professors?
Gender and Education
177
R. I had this conversation with a male professor. But I think that they … eh, no,
a female professor also told me the same thing. Perhaps they are right, I
mean, maybe they know what they are talking about.
Similarly, Kiriaki’s decision to seek a job related to educational software (and education in general) instead of pursuing a career in network analysis reveals a strategy we
describe as strategic conformism. Instead of struggling for her rights in a male-dominated field, she prefers to compromise, because in the long run this is easier. An important factor in her decision is the dominant bio-political ideal of motherhood:
Q. What are you plans for the future?
K. [...] Eh, I have started to change my mind, and I am considering educational
software now.
Q. Do you think this suits you better?
K. I think so... because I’m a woman. [...] It’s difficult for a woman to combine
job and family if she works in the private sector.
Q. In what way?
K. Employers are commonly prejudiced towards female workers. They are
afraid that at some point they’ll decide to become pregnant, and get maternity leave. This, of course, isn’t in the interest of the company; so female
workers are generally considered less productive than their male colleagues.
We see that Kiriaki not only prioritises motherhood, but she does so by also
undoubtedly conforming to patriarchal gender roles. In simply complying with the
dominant gender order, she never questions her theoretical premise that family life
and raising children is an exclusively female responsibility. Hence, she accepts to sacrifice her initial career ambitions, and settle for a more ‘compatible’ job in education:
Q.
K.
Q.
K.
Q.
K.
Q.
K.
Q.
K.
Q.
K.
Do you think that being a woman has made things easier or harder for you?
[...] A woman cannot assume a managerial position, the way a man can.
Because of family obligations?
That’s right. For instance, if the children have a problem at school, it’s their
mom who will probably see to it; not the dad.
Why?
Because she is the mother.
So, in your opinion, motherhood inherently poses obstacles to a woman’s
career?
Yes.
And how do you propose to solve this?
By working in the public sector.3
So, you’ve already sorted it out …
I generally dislike the idea of working in the public sector. I’ve put a considerate amount of time and effort into my studies, and I don’t find
working as a civil servant challenging. I’ve worked really hard to get this
degree. On the other hand, I think that raising a family is a life decision
[...] Maybe I will look for a job in the public sector at first, and later,
when my kids are a little bit older and I have gained some work experience,
I could seek employment at a private company …
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Y. Pechtelidis et al.
We have seen that Kiriaki and Rena choose to perform a socially recognisable and
acceptable form of femininity through a vocational choice related to educational software, although they claim to possess ‘algorithmic thinking’, and they would rather do
something like web design. In consciously conforming to acceptable comportment both
in the public (work) and the private sphere (reproduction), subjects adhere to a particular ‘micro-physics of power’, which perpetuates the dominant gender order (Barkty
2002). The reasoning behind Rena’s and Kiriaki’s choice lies in their awareness that
professional life is deeply patriarchal and utilitarian; they are fully conscious that it
is rather difficult for women to attain recognition and a successful career in IT. Moreover, it seems that certain mentors (professors or family members) also have influenced
them in their decision; by advising female students against pursuing a career in IT, they
direct them towards more traditional roles and careers, and so they comply with the
dominant gender order. This way they support a gendered labour division, according
to which computer engineering and network design is considered inherently masculine,
whilst developing educational software and education in general are seen as feminine
professions. Although the development of educational software also presupposes substantial programming, it is discursively constructed as inferior (because of its feminine
connotations). It is also seen as practical and applied, and thus closer to ‘plain use’ than
‘true connoisseurship’. The channelling of female informatics students towards gendered careers serves the bio-political imperative that women adhere to the cultural
ideal of motherhood. This ideal is defined in relation to ideas about ‘reproduction’,
‘continuity’, ‘kinship’, ‘gender’, and ‘sexuality’, and is linked to various aspects of
the cultural construction of the body. In this framework, giving birth and raising children is fundamental to the cultural recognisability of being a ‘woman’. Moreover, to
perform the ideal of motherhood becomes an essential condition for women to be
appreciated as fully ‘human’.
However, today both Kiriaki and Rena have successful careers in technology and do
not have children so far. Kiriaki did an MA in human–computer interaction and works
in the UK. In comparison, Rena followed an allegedly more traditional career path in
the development of educational software and gaming, yet she works for a big research
programme with funding from the EU. As for the other three interviewees, Niki, who
claimed to occupy a space in between (neither user, nor geek), now does web modelling. Unsurprisingly, Dinos and Anestis work as freelance programmers, and their
business relates to home energy saving.
Conclusions
In our paper, we have described the dominant cultural stereotypes about the uneasy
relationship between women and technology. However, the cultural identification of
technology with masculinity and the subsequent female exclusion alone have proved
insufficient to explain this complex relationship. Through our research we found that
there exists a far more subtle distinction between ‘users’ and ‘connoisseurs’, and that
the struggle over power revolves around a specific form of hegemonic masculinity.
Obviously women are not unaware of patriarchal power relations in the field of technology, nor are they usually directly banned from participating in it. The reason for their
self-exclusion lies in the fact that to assume a dominant position within the technological discourse (i.e. the subject position of the ‘connoisseur’), they need to renounce their
socially accepted subject position as ‘women’. In other words, women are trapped
Gender and Education
179
between a rock (the hegemonic gender order) and a hard place (the subject position of
‘hegemonic masculinity’, with all the social consequences it entails).
Therefore, we found that most female students in our research attempted to handle
the tension that results from being ‘female’, and performing certain forms of hegemonic
masculinity, such as ‘good at technology and math’ (Mendick 2006, 83; Chronaki
2011; Chronaki and Pechtelidis 2012) by trying to compromise aspects of conformism
and resistance to the dominant gender discourse.
The strategy they employed is described as ‘strategic conformism’. As Chronaki
(2011) has argued discussing female choices, although some young women were
good at maths, enjoyed technology, and studied a subject which is traditionally seen
as masculine, they still complied with the rules of the dominant gender discourse
and consciously opted for a gendered career and traditional family roles, because
they believed this was the most convenient thing to do. As Charles and Bradley
(2008, 196) argue, freedom of choice ‘implies both the right to be free from overt discrimination (should they elect to pursue a traditionally male-dominated field of study)
and the right to choose poorly paid female-labeled career paths, if they so desire’.
However, it did not seem to occur to them that strategic conformism might be a way
to make ends meet, but that it eventually perpetuates the dominant gender binary. As we
elaborated, they considered engaging in technology to be a purely individual choice,
failing to see that personal interest or particular motives are always already socially
determined. They never queried or considered the social implications of their
choices, even when we raised awareness to this issue during the interviews. Therefore,
they also could not really offer a persuasive explanation regarding the gender gap in
technology. Rather, they saw themselves as merely distinct subjects in a competitive
society (even if they claimed to dislike it), because they were not accustomed to perceiving themselves as members of a class, gendered, unequal society (Ball, Maguire,
and Macrae 2000, 4).
In this sense, the students we interviewed lacked the language or the concepts to link
subjective preferences, desires, or interests to the broader social context, and to
acknowledge the social limitations of individual choice (Mendick 2006, 108). What
is more, even the female students reproduced patriarchy at a much deeper level. In
claiming competencies such as ‘algorithmic thinking’, they assumed characteristics
of a hegemonic masculinity at an individual level; yet, what they failed to acknowledge
was that this way they further bought in the gender binary that excluded them in the first
place.
Such cultural beliefs are particularly difficult to challenge, precisely because they
are supported by the liberal discourse of ‘freedom of choice’. Moreover, their persistence makes us aware of the productive aspects of modern power, and the ways subjects
are constructed as such – at least in a western European democratised country. Power is
exercised not only through repression or legislation, but also through the regulation of
subjects; power takes the form of social norms, which designate not only what we want
or how to achieve it, but also how we get to want something in the first place (Butler
1993; Foucault 1995). This is why it is necessary to identify the social structures and
discourses that permeate our choices, interests, and resources, and to acknowledge
that identities are socially constructed, and thus contingent and fluid. Only if we
accept this, will it be possible to curb the stifling impact of an objectified liberal political
and philosophical discourse, which, by propagating the ideology of ‘free choice’, holds
individuals exclusively responsible for their success or worse their failures. Only then
will subjects realise the gender-biased (class, race, etc.) nature of their decisions.
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Y. Pechtelidis et al.
Acknowledgements
We thank all students who participated in the study, which was part of the project ‘Mathematics
and Technologies in Education: The gender perspective’ EPEAK Pythagoras I (co-funded by the
Greek Ministry of Education and the European Union) 2004–2007, Project leader: Anna
Chronaki.
Notes
1. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087197/, accessed 14/05/12.
2. The fact that the development of educational software also presupposes programming skills
is completely obscured by the gendered connotations of working in education. The association with the ‘feminine’ seems to compensate for interfering with things ‘masculine’.
3. Working in the private sector in Greece in most cases means that it is expected that employees work after hours (usually without getting paid for their extra time).
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