Diversity is a term that is broadly used and challenging for informatics research, development and education. Diversity concerns may relate to unequal participation, knowledge and methodology, curricula, institutional planning etc. For a lot of these areas, measures, guidelines and best practices on diversity awareness exist. A systemic, sustainable impact of diversity measures on informatics is still largely missing. In this paper I explore what working with diversity and gender concepts in informatics entails, what the main challenges are and provide thoughts for improvement. The paper includes definitions of diversity and intersectionality, reflections on the disciplinary basis of informatics and practical implications of integrating diversity in informatics research and development. In the final part, two concepts from the social sciences and the humanities, the notion of “third space”/hybridity and the notion of “feminist ethics of care”, serve as a lens to foster more sustainable ways of working with diversity in informatics.
Den Boden putzen, das Bett abziehen, einen Blumenstrauß arrangieren – Bemühungen um Sauberkeit sowie eine angenehme Raumatmosphäre obliegen im Krankenhaus meist weiblichen* Pflegerinnen, Reinigungskräften und Hauswirtschafterinnen. Im Klinikalltag vermischen sich Anforderungen an hygienische Sauberkeit unter Prozessen der Ökonomisierung mit Logiken des Marketings sowie mit affektiv-emotionalen Bedürfnissen der Akteur_innen dieser Räume. Obwohl die Maßstäbe klinischer Hygiene auf medizinischem Wissen basieren, sind die Arbeitsteilung sowie Ansprüche an Sauberkeit auf verschiedenen Hierarchieebenen zugleich von vergeschlechtlichten und teils rassifizierten Vorstellungen durchdrungen, die über den klinischen Kontext hinausweisen. Dies legt schon eine Beschäftigung mit der Geschichte der Bakteriologie nahe: Die Logik und Sprache der Infektionsabwehr ist in Wissenschaft und Alltag auch verwoben mit sozialen Differenzmarkierungen.
Unter Rückgriff auf die Ergebnisse einer Ethnografie zu Sauberkeit und Reinigungsarbeiten im Krankenhaus, die wissensgeschichtlich fundiert werden, wird in dem Beitrag die Frage nach der (feminisierten) Sorge für die Umwelt mit der Frage nach der Atmosphäre klinischer Räume verknüpft. Auf welche Weise und mit welchen Effekten verschränken sich wissenschaftlich-medizinisches Hygienewissen mit einem alltäglichen, jedoch historisierbaren Wissen über schöne und angenehme Sauberkeit, das immer noch weiblich konnotiert ist?
Research has characterized Nadezhda Teffi as the female Chekhov.1 However, connections can also be found between her work and that of Ivan S. Turgenev. In particular the one-act plays (Conversation on a Highroad; 1851) and (The Woman Question; 1907) are suitable for comparison. Not only does my comparison consider the gender conflict between man and woman, but also a dialectic method which Teffi may have discovered in Turgenev's work and elaborated further. The dialectical considerations are connected with different comic approaches: the psychological comedy of the realist Turgenev in the middle of the 19th century and the mechanical comedy of the utopian Teffi at the start of the 20th century. Its mechanical comicality shows that relates to an international debate, in which Paul Julius Mobius' essay 'Uber den physiologischen Schwachsinn des Weibes' ('On the Physiological Idiocy of the Female'; 1900) may well have played an unfavourable role.
Background Boredom during learning activities has the potential of impeding attention, motivation, learning and eventually achievement. Yet, research focusing on its possible antecedents seems to have received less attention especially within the physics domain. Based on assumptions of the Control Value Theory of Achievement Emotions (CVTAE), this study aimed at examining gender differences and structural relationships between students' reported perceived teacher autonomy support (PTAS), cognitive appraisals (self-efficacy and task value) and learning-related boredom in physics. A sample of 375 (56% females) randomly selected 9(th) grade students (mean age = 15.03 years; SD = 1.02) from five secondary schools in Masaka district of Uganda took part in the study. Results Data collected from students' self-reports using standardised instruments revealed that higher levels of PTAS, self-efficacy, and task value were significantly associated with lower levels of boredom during physics learning. Females reported significantly greater task value for learning physics than the males. Self-efficacy (beta = - .10, p < .05) and task value (beta = - .09, p < .01) partially mediated the relationship between PTAS and boredom. PTAS showed significant direct negative contributions to boredom (beta = - .34, p < .001). Conclusion These findings provide support for theory and practice about the importance of promoting autonomy among students by adjusting instructional behaviours among teachers of physics. Teacher autonomy supportive behaviours influence formation of students' beliefs about ability, subjective value and learning-related boredom in physics. Implications and suggestions for further research are also discussed in this paper.
Gender and framing
(2019)
Framing literature has so far failed to construct gender as an analytical category that shapes the ways in which we perceive, identify and act upon grievances. This article builds on the insights of feminist theory and employs the conceptual vocabulary of the social movement framing perspective in maintaining gender as a main parameter of framing processes. Drawing on ethnographic research on local community struggles against hydropower plants in the Eastern Black Sea Region of Turkey, this article maintains the centrality of gender to framing processes. It analyzes the gendered difference between men’s macro-framings and women’s cultural and socio-ecological framings, which is rooted in their differing relationships with their immediate environment, as well as with the state and its institutions. The article maintains that the framings of women, which represent the immediacy of the environment, are more effective in gaining public support and shaping movement outcomes. In this sense, constructing gender as an important determinant of “frame variation” is essential not only to reveal women’s frames that are largely silenced through and within the mechanisms of social movement organization, but also to stress their centrality in shaping repertoires of contention, public reception and movement outcomes.
Organizations increasingly use social media and especially social networking sites (SNS) to support their marketing agenda, enhance collaboration, and develop new capabilities. However, the success of SNS initiatives is largely dependent on sustainable user participation. In this study, we argue that the continuance intentions of users may be gender sensitive. To theorize and investigate gender differences in the determinants of continuance intentions, this study draws on the expectation-confirmation model, the uses and gratification theory, as well as the self-construal theory and its extensions. Our survey of 488 users shows that while both men and women are motivated by the ability to self enhance, there are some gender differences. Specifically, while women are mainly driven by relational uses, such as maintaining close ties and getting access to social information on close and distant networks, men base their continuance intentions on their ability to gain information of a general nature. Our research makes several contributions to the discourse in strategic information systems literature concerning the use of social media by individuals and organizations. Theoretically, it expands the understanding of the phenomenon of continuance intentions and specifically the role of the gender differences in its determinants. On a practical level, it delivers insights for SNS providers and marketers into how satisfaction and continuance intentions of male and female SNS users can be differentially promoted. Furthermore, as organizations increasingly rely on corporate social networks to foster collaboration and innovation, our insights deliver initial recommendations on how organizational social media initiatives can be supported with regard to gender-based differences.
This longitudinal study examined relationships between student-perceived teaching for meaning, support for autonomy, and competence in mathematic classrooms (Time 1), and students’ achievement goal orientations and engagement in mathematics 6 months later (Time 2). We tested whether student-perceived instructional characteristics at Time 1 indirectly related to student engagement at Time 2, via their achievement goal orientations (Time 2), and, whether student gender moderated these relationships. Participants were ninth and tenth graders (55.2% girls) from 46 classrooms in ten secondary schools in Berlin, Germany. Only data from students who participated at both timepoints were included (N = 746 out of total at Time 1 1118; dropout 33.27%). Longitudinal structural equation modeling showed that student-perceived teaching for meaning and support for competence indirectly predicted intrinsic motivation and effort, via students’ mastery goal orientation. These paths were equivalent for girls and boys. The findings are significant for mathematics education, in identifying motivational processes that partly explain the relationships between student-perceived teaching for meaning and competence support and intrinsic motivation and effort in mathematics.