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Hello,
Super short term lurker (since today!). It was suggested by various people on Twitter (hello people of Twitter) that I join code4lib because of this exchange and it greatly touches on one of my passions (see: http://exitpursuedbyabear.net/2012/11/why-white-men-should-not-mostly-write-about-gender-disparity-in-technology/). What I was able to see via the archives on the website and here has been awesome!
Which brings me to Becky's point below: As someone who is not a coder, has no plans on being a coder, and would rather shove things in her eyeballs then learn programming, Becky has a valid point about broadening the reach of women in tech. I've noticed a trend that in the library world (articles and such), when one talks about being a "geek," it seems to be synonymous with "coder." And those of us who are not coding, who are say network geeks or hardware geeks or somewhere else, are kind of left out in the cold. In a way, we're excluded from the culture as well. (I'm a network geek. I used to configure and manage tier 1 (backbone) routers back in the late '90s/ early '00s). BGP 4 LYFE.
In the library world there is a huge dichotomy in the geekdom as this is mainly female orientated profession but the technical side is mainly male dominated. There needs to be a balance struck and that is going to be hard. But I think making an initiative like this (creating a Code4LibWomen) is a good idea, but by being far too inclusive (only available to those who are in the community of Code4Lib) is restrictive. I think it would be better served if it was pushed to a wider audience to make women in tech, who may not be on Code4Lib, find a community of like minded individuals. A suggestion I had made on my blog was that a SIG becreated at ALA or LITA or some other more broad reaching group. Another was working with the Ada Initiative as well. I think there is a lot that can be done, but it should be addressed on a much broader scale.
The problem with sexism in the geek world is not new, by any stretch of the imagination, but what IS new is that more women are talking openly about it, everywhere. This is exciting. And promising. It's like 1920 all over again!
_lisa/@pnkrcklibrarian
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Lisa M. Rabey, MA, MLIS
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Systems & Web Librarian
Grand Rapids Community College
p: 616.234.3786 | e: [log in to unmask]
http://grcc.edu/library | http://grcc.edu/library/socialmedia
>>> On 28/11/2012 at 16:00, Becky Yoose <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> If this (as in a group for women in library technology) is going to become
> reality, I want to see this take one step broader, and incorporate ALL
> women in library tech, and not just designating it to one subset of the
> library community (code4lib). code4lib can be a collaborator with another
> organization (LITA?) to reach more people. This is a broader issue than
> code4lib, and needs to be treated as such.
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