Science, Technology and Gender: Challenges and Opportunities

FEMMSS5/CSWIP 2014: Call for Proposals

Submission deadline February 15, 2014

Submissions are invited for the 2014 meeting of the Canadian Society for Women in Philosophy to be held at the University of Waterloo, August 10 to 13, 2014.  We welcome feminist papers, posters, panels and workshops related to Science, Technology and Gender. Conference presentations are eligible for submission for consideration and review in a resulting anthology or special journal issue. Topics can include but need not be limited to:

Challenges to and challenging scientific literacy
Implicit bias and stereotype threat
Creating equitable Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics organizations and institutions
Gender, oppression, and the public understanding of science
Rhetoric, argumentation, and gendered communication
Epistemologies of ignorance
Policy of/for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics
Intersectionality in practice and study of science and technology
The ethics and politics of science and technology
Science, technology and global justice
Feminist methodologies in the humanities, social and natural sciences
Production of biological “differences”
Feminist scholarship of teaching and learning
Professional development (ex. Effective interdisciplinary communication/teaching/research)

Submission instructions

You are permitted one submission, unless you are submitting a poster.  If you are submitting a poster, you can additionally submit an abstract for a paper, panel, or workshop.

 

To submit please go to https://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=stg2013 and sign up for an account.  If you have questions, email science.technology.gender@gmail.com.

·      Individual papers and posters:  Please provide a title, 300-word abstract, and 3-10 keywords. At the beginning of the abstract please indicate if your submission is a poster.  There is no need to upload anything, so please tick the box that says, “abstract only.”

·      Panels:  Please provide a title, 300-word abstract, and 3-10 keywords for the panel as a whole.  Also, upload a single document that includes the title and 300-word abstract for each paper. Please take care not to identify authors.

·      Workshops:  Please provide a title, 300-word abstract describing the workshop rationale, and 3-10 keywords.  Also, upload a 300-word description of the activities in which your audience will engage. Please take care not to identify authors.

This conference will be held in conjunction with FEMMSS5.

Raising decent men

Some new fathers agonising about how to raise their sons in a culture of violence against women:

http://www.yesmagazine.org/happiness/a-father-s-perspective-on-raising-decent-men?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=20131009

Brennan and Isaacs in Ms!

The feminist philosopher fitness bloggers get interviewed in Ms! Enjoy…

The Amazing Invisible Woman

A classic. (Thanks, F!)

Comic relief for saudi women drivers?

This is sweet, but not clear that those responsible for the current craziness will understand that’s it’s a parody…

Oxford philosopher Peter King has some things to say about epistemic injustice

The Independent recently ran a story about some fairly horrifying misogyny at Oxford. According to the story:

A rugby club at Oxford University has caused outrage after an email was circulated to members earlier this week, suggesting that they spike freshers’ drinks.

Pembroke College Rugby Football Club’s then-social secretary Woo Kim sent [an] email – which was entitled “FREE PUSSY” – on Monday, instructing members of the club about to “pick” a female fresher of their choice, and proposing a “challenge” for their annual social later in the week.

Mr Kim warned members to be “as clandestine as possible in your deed”, while instructing them to “please bring TWO bottles of wine – one for yourself and one for your guest”.

In the comments, Pembroke philosophy lecturer Peter J. King shows up to offer some opinions. Some choice excerpts include:

I consider the notion of epistemic injustice a pseudo-philosophical concept designed to enable people to publish more empty articles and organise more empty conferences for the purposes of career advancement.

It takes no courage to write a piece like this, which newspapers love to print and people love to read.

I was primarily commenting on journalistic sensationalism — something that was hardly needed when reporting this bit of unpleasant undergraduate stupidity [my emphasis]. Also, many things are real and important (car crashes, robbery with violence, etc.), but I’d still deprecate giving them pompous labels and creating fake philosophical categories out of them.

Nice.

Rape crisis Scotland: ‘As if’.

Fantastic (though terrible that it should be needed, of course).

 

 

Horror flicks for or by women

If you want to watch a horror film this Halloween, but feel that the genre objectifies women (and then cuts them into small bits and eats them), you might be pleased to learn that quite a few of them are directed by women. Here’s a list here.

One of my personal favourites is missing from that list: Halloween, if not actuallly directed by a woman, was co-written and produced by Debra Hill, and starred Jamie Lee Curtis in a role that certainly doesn’t lack dignity.

Also, the new Carrie is directed by Kimberley Pierce. Not a bad call to have a woman directing a film that’s basically about periods and mother/daughter relationships!

Is Miss Piggy a Feminist Icon?

See the arguments in favour at Fit, Feminist, and (Almost) Fifty.

What do you think?

Whose nude?

No longer does ‘nude’ in the shoe world just mean flesh-tone only if you’re white. Christian Louboutin’s new ‘Les Nudes’ collection features shoes in five shades of nude.

[F]or ages in the fashion industry, the color nude has been synonymous with beige or pale peach, even going so far as to be called “flesh-toned,” as long as that flesh was white.

Louboutin’s decision to add a spectrum of nudes to his famous red-soled shoes comes on the heels of a dustup at last month’s New York Fashion Week, when Naomi Campbell and others released the names of designers whose runways lacked diverse models.

Read more here. Of course, we can debate the oppressive dynamics of the fashion industry and its cultural context, but still. Progress.