Dear All, Caitlin, I look forward to seeing what you come up with! Following up on Elinor, Chun's first book on "Control and Freedom" also touches on the gendered language male and female ports, etc. I think Avital Ronell touched on similar topics in a discussion of switchboards and operators in the telephone system--an important source for a lot of informatic metaphors and techniques. I saw it in one of Ronell's essays leading up to her "Telephone Book," but the exact citation slips my mind. Dr. Emily Goodmann <emily.goodmann@gmail.com> -- on this listserv? -- knows a whole lot more about that literature, maybe she'll pipe in! Best, b On 5/23/17 2:19 PM, Elinor Carmi wrote:

Hi Caitlin,

Wendy Hui Kyong Chun has something in relation to this in her article - On Software, or the Persistence of Visual Knowledge.

You can find it here -> http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/1526381043320741?journalCode...

All the best,

*/Elinor Carmi,/* */Ph.D. Candidate and Visiting Lecturer,/* */Department of Media & Communications,/* */Goldsmiths, University of London./* */www.pinkeee.com/* */Twitter: @Elinor_Carmi/* */ /* ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *From:* Members <members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org> on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) <cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu> *Sent:* Tuesday, May 23, 2017 1:11:41 AM *To:* members@SIGCIS.org *Subject:* [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard" Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies.

Thank you!

All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

-- Bernard Geoghegan Senior Lecturer, Media & Communication, Coventry University (UK) www.bernardg.com

Hi Caitlin, I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg: Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves." Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks." And there's this <http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf> unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey. I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested. Cheers, Mark On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu> wrote:

Caitlin, this is an interesting study!

I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way.

The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!)

In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies.

- Bill

________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard"

Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies.

Thank you!

All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/ listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965. It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian. “Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity). “Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian. This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships. Best, Paul

On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net> wrote:

My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it".

cheers, Mike Willegal

...

On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com <mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com>> wrote:

Hi Caitlin,

I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg:

Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves."

Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks."

And there's this <http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf> unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey.

I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested.

Cheers, Mark

On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu <mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu>> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study!

I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way.

The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!)

In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies.

- Bill

________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org <mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org>] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu <mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu>] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org <mailto:members@SIGCIS.org> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard"

Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies.

Thank you!

All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/ <http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

---

This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History <http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute <http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows <http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/> Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu Terse replies are deliberate <http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why!  <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu <http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/>

Miriam, Thank you for this succinct and well stated analysis. The irony certainly was not lost on me as I read both threads over the past day. You have provided a sorely needed intervention. Thank you. By the way, before my academic turn, these kinds of terms that were in constant and common usage within the IT field certainly did not go unnoticed by me as I worked in that field and contented with them every day, uncomfortably. --Sarah --- S a r a h T. R o b e r t s, P h. D. Assistant Professor University of California, Los Angeles Department of Information Studies Graduate School of Education & Information Studies https://is.gseis.ucla.edu/ Blogging periodically at http://illusionofvolition.com

On May 24, 2017, at 08:58, Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu> wrote:

Hi Folks,

Two thoughts here:

Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents.

Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever.

Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies.

Miriam E. Sweeney Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies

The University of Alabama 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522 mesweeney1@ua.edu | https://slis.ua.edu/

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu> wrote:

Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965.

It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian.

“Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity).

“Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian.

This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships.

Best,

Paul

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net> wrote:

My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it".

cheers, Mike Willegal

...

On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Caitlin,

I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg:

Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves."

Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks."

And there's this unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey.

I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested.

Cheers, Mark

...

On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study!

I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way.

The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!)

In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies.

- Bill

________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard"

Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies.

Thank you!

All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information and History Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows

Starting July 1, 2017:

William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu

Terse replies are deliberate. Here's why!

University of Michigan School of Information 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

Great debate! In Spanish these threads could be much more interestings :-) You need definite articles by gender. We say "la placa base" for motherboard, but we say "el conector macho" and "el conector hembra". Note that "placa" comes with "la" (female) and "conector" with "el" (male). However I think it is much more interesting that some tasks in the early informatics profession were named with female or male concordance. In the 1970's, they always said "los programadores" (male article for programmers) and "las perforistas" (female article for the key-punchers). And last but not least, we should try to avoid presentism, this debate will be softer although more tangled with other disciplines. Best, -- Dr. Jordi Fornés Computer Architecture Department Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya - BarcelonaTech El 24/05/2017 a las 18:17, Sarah T. Roberts escribió:

Miriam,

Thank you for this succinct and well stated analysis. The irony certainly was not lost on me as I read both threads over the past day. You have provided a sorely needed intervention. Thank you.

By the way, before my academic turn, these kinds of terms that were in constant and common usage within the IT field certainly did not go unnoticed by me as I worked in that field and contented with them every day, uncomfortably.

--Sarah ---

S a r a h T. R o b e r t s, P h. D.

Assistant Professor University of California, Los Angeles Department of Information Studies Graduate School of Education & Information Studies https://is.gseis.ucla.edu/

Blogging periodically at http://illusionofvolition.com <http://illusionofvolition.com/>

On May 24, 2017, at 08:58, Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu <mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>> wrote:

...

Hi Folks,

Two thoughts here:

Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents.

Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever.

Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies.

Miriam E. Sweeney

Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies

The University of Alabama <https://www.ua.edu> 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522 <tel:205-348-1522> mesweeney1@ua.edu <mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu> | https://slis.ua.edu/

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu <mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote:

Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965.

It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian.

“Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity).

“Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian.

This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships.

Best,

Paul

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net <mailto:mike@willegal.net>> wrote:

My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it".

cheers, Mike Willegal

...

On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com <mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com>> wrote:

Hi Caitlin,

I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg:

Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves."

Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks."

And there's this <http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf> unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey.

I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested.

Cheers, Mark

On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu <mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu>> wrote:

Caitlin, this is an interesting study!

I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way.

The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!)

In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies.

- Bill

________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org <mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org>] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu <mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu>] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org <mailto:members@SIGCIS.org> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard"

Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies.

Thank you!

All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/ <http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History <http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute <http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows <http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/>

_Starting July 1, 2017:_ _ _ William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu <mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu>

Terse replies are deliberate <http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/>

University of Michigan School of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu <http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

What is meant by “information and computing studies” in terms of the academy? Is it Library and Information Science, Cultural Studies, or perhaps some subset of CISE (Computer and Information Science & Engineering)?

How about all of them. A perusal of the internet reveals that Dr. Sweeney's home field is library and information science. Her research is interdisciplinary. --- S a r a h T. R o b e r t s, P h. D. Assistant Professor University of California, Los Angeles Department of Information Studies Graduate School of Education & Information Studies https://is.gseis.ucla.edu/ Blogging periodically at http://illusionofvolition.com

On May 24, 2017, at 10:05, Paul Fishwick <metaphorz@gmail.com> wrote:

Miriam In your last paragraph, you note:

"Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies.”

What is meant by “information and computing studies” in terms of the academy? Is it Library and Information Science, Cultural Studies, or perhaps some subset of CISE (Computer and Information Science & Engineering)?

I ask to be better educated on the “challenges” you are facing. As for the Association for Computing Machinery, there exists a classification called “Social and Professional Topics”, however, in the places where I have studied or taught (Engineering Schools), this area is not well represented. Is your hope, or challenge, to get it into Engineering Schools? As for departments outside of Engineering (e.g., in a Humanities-oriented school), the topics you mention seem to have better coverage. Here is the link to the 2012 ACM classification tree:

http://www.acm.org/about/class/class/2012

-paul

Paul Fishwick, PhD Distinguished University Chair of Arts, Technology, and Emerging Communication Professor of Computer Science Director, Creative Automata Laboratory The University of Texas at Dallas Arts & Technology 800 West Campbell Road, AT10 Richardson, TX 75080-3021 Home: utdallas.edu/atec/fishwick Blog 1: medium.com/@metaphorz

...

On May 24, 2017, at 10:58 AM, Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu> wrote:

Hi Folks,

Two thoughts here:

Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents.

Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever.

Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies.

Miriam E. Sweeney Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies

The University of Alabama 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522 mesweeney1@ua.edu | https://slis.ua.edu/

...

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu> wrote:

Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965.

It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian.

“Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity).

“Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian.

This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships.

Best,

Paul

...

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net> wrote:

My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it".

cheers, Mike Willegal

...

...

On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Caitlin,

I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg:

Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves."

Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks."

And there's this unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey.

I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested.

Cheers, Mark

...

On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study!

I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way.

The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!)

In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies.

- Bill

________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard"

Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies.

Thank you!

All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information and History Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows

Starting July 1, 2017:

William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu

Terse replies are deliberate. Here's why!

University of Michigan School of Information 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

Show Quoted Content

...

On May 24, 2017, at 10:58 AM, Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu> wrote:

Hi Folks,

Two thoughts here:

Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents.

Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever.

Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies.

Miriam E. Sweeney Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies

The University of Alabama 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522 mesweeney1@ua.edu | https://slis.ua.edu/

...

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu> wrote:

Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965.

It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian.

“Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity).

“Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian.

This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships.

Best,

Paul

...

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net> wrote:

My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it".

cheers, Mike Willegal

...

...

On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Caitlin,

I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg:

Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves."

Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks."

And there's this unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey.

I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested.

Cheers, Mark

...

On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study!

I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way.

The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!)

In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies.

- Bill

________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard"

Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies.

Thank you!

All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information and History Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows

Starting July 1, 2017:

William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu

Terse replies are deliberate. Here's why!

University of Michigan School of Information 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

All, in response to Miriam’s post: I did not say that mammals have gender. My post could certainly have been clearer about the difference between sex (the relevant metaphor in the cases I mentioned) and gender as a social construction. Anyone who knows my work will realize that I am one of the many people, of all genders, who have worked tirelessly for the last 35 years to promote attention to gender studies, to women, to race, and to LGBT issues in the history of computing. So I am hardly “uninformed” on this subject. If anyone is curious, I will be happy to provide a long list of bona fides offline. This thread started with Caitlin’s query about gendered terms in engineering. It was a question seeking answers. The replies on this thread may have come mostly from men, but all were courteous, friendly, and clearly intended to be thoughtful contributions to a scholarly discussion. I apologize if something in my post was offensive, but I reject the idea that men commenting on gender issues is somehow out of line. Of course it would be great if more women would chime in. Let’s please return this discussion to its previous respectful tone. Best, Paul

On May 24, 2017, at 11:58 , Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu <mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>> wrote:

Hi Folks,

Two thoughts here:

Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents.

Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever.

Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies.

Miriam E. Sweeney Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies

The University of Alabama <https://www.ua.edu/> 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522 <tel:205-348-1522> mesweeney1@ua.edu <mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu> | https://slis.ua.edu/ <https://slis.ua.edu/>

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu <mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote:

Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965.

It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian.

“Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity).

“Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian.

This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships.

Best,

Paul

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net <mailto:mike@willegal.net>> wrote:

My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it".

cheers, Mike Willegal

...

On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com <mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com>> wrote:

Hi Caitlin,

I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg:

Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves."

Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks."

And there's this <http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf> unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey.

I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested.

Cheers, Mark

On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu <mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu>> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study!

I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way.

The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!)

In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies.

- Bill

________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org <mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org>] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu <mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu>] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org <mailto:members@SIGCIS.org> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard"

Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies.

Thank you!

All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/ <http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

---

This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org> ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History <http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute <http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows <http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/>

Starting July 1, 2017:

William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu <mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu>

Terse replies are deliberate <http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why!  <http://emailcharter.org/>

University of Michigan School of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu <http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

---

This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org> ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History <http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute <http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows <http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/>

Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu <mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu> Terse replies are deliberate <http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why!  <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu <http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/>

This response speaks for itself. It certainly would be great if more women felt as if they could chime in. But only if they are properly respectful (i.e don't proffer critiques). I have nothing more to add here. -M Sent from my iPhone On May 24, 2017, at 4:58 PM, Paul N.Edwards <pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote: All, in response to Miriam’s post: I did not say that mammals have gender. My post could certainly have been clearer about the difference between sex (the relevant metaphor in the cases I mentioned) and gender as a social construction. Anyone who knows my work will realize that I am one of the many people, of all genders, who have worked tirelessly for the last 35 years to promote attention to gender studies, to women, to race, and to LGBT issues in the history of computing. So I am hardly “uninformed” on this subject. If anyone is curious, I will be happy to provide a long list of bona fides offline. This thread started with Caitlin’s query about gendered terms in engineering. It was a question seeking answers. The replies on this thread may have come mostly from men, but all were courteous, friendly, and clearly intended to be thoughtful contributions to a scholarly discussion. I apologize if something in my post was offensive, but I reject the idea that men commenting on gender issues is somehow out of line. Of course it would be great if more women would chime in. Let’s please return this discussion to its previous respectful tone. Best, Paul On May 24, 2017, at 11:58 , Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>> wrote: Hi Folks, Two thoughts here: Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents. Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever. Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies. Miriam E. Sweeney Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies The University of Alabama<https://www.ua.edu/> 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522<tel:205-348-1522> mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu> | https://slis.ua.edu/ On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote: Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965. It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian. “Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity). “Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian. This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships. Best, Paul On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net<mailto:mike@willegal.net>> wrote: My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it". cheers, Mike Willegal On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com<mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com>> wrote: Hi Caitlin, I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg: Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves." Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks." And there's this<http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf> unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey. I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested. Cheers, Mark On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu<mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu>> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study! I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way. The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!) In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies. - Bill ________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org<mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org>] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu<mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu>] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org<mailto:members@SIGCIS.org> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard" Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies. Thank you! All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/ _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/> Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu> Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu<http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/> Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu> Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu<http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

"There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents.” Really? Look up "male + female connectors" on Google images and see if you can figure it out. Completely obvious. Completely literal. BTW, to call Paul Edwards ‘uninformed’ is pretty rich. Respectfully, Dag — Dag Spicer Senior Curator Computer History Museum 1401 N Shoreline Blvd Mountain View, CA 94043 On May 24, 2017, at 3:17 PM, pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu> wrote: Yes. Scholars should be respectful of each other. Sent by my iPhone. Don't blame me. On May 24, 2017, at 18:15, Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>> wrote: This response speaks for itself. It certainly would be great if more women felt as if they could chime in. But only if they are properly respectful (i.e don't proffer critiques). I have nothing more to add here. -M Sent from my iPhone On May 24, 2017, at 4:58 PM, Paul N.Edwards <pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote: All, in response to Miriam’s post: I did not say that mammals have gender. My post could certainly have been clearer about the difference between sex (the relevant metaphor in the cases I mentioned) and gender as a social construction. Anyone who knows my work will realize that I am one of the many people, of all genders, who have worked tirelessly for the last 35 years to promote attention to gender studies, to women, to race, and to LGBT issues in the history of computing. So I am hardly “uninformed” on this subject. If anyone is curious, I will be happy to provide a long list of bona fides offline. This thread started with Caitlin’s query about gendered terms in engineering. It was a question seeking answers. The replies on this thread may have come mostly from men, but all were courteous, friendly, and clearly intended to be thoughtful contributions to a scholarly discussion. I apologize if something in my post was offensive, but I reject the idea that men commenting on gender issues is somehow out of line. Of course it would be great if more women would chime in. Let’s please return this discussion to its previous respectful tone. Best, Paul On May 24, 2017, at 11:58 , Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>> wrote: Hi Folks, Two thoughts here: Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents. Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever. Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies. Miriam E. Sweeney Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies The University of Alabama<https://www.ua.edu/> 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522<tel:205-348-1522> mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu> | https://slis.ua.edu/ On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote: Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965. It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian. “Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity). “Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian. This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships. Best, Paul On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net<mailto:mike@willegal.net>> wrote: My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it". cheers, Mike Willegal On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com<mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com>> wrote: Hi Caitlin, I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg: Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves." Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks." And there's this<http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf> unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey. I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested. Cheers, Mark On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu<mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu>> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study! I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way. The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!) In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies. - Bill ________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org<mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org>] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu<mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu>] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org<mailto:members@SIGCIS.org> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard" Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies. Thank you! All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/ _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/> Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu> Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu<http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/> Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu> Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu<http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

Hi Laine! I think there is a certain fetishizing of the unknown that is as irksome to those of us with technical backgorunds (as well as our history backgrounds) as what you say are your tribe’s deconstructing of obviousness. Between the engineer’s hetero-utilitarian word choice (male = it sticks out; female = it goes in) and claims of say, how a wall socket embodys the patriarchy, there has to be a middle ground; one where ‘ground truth’ based on more than a cursory technical acquanitance with the subject and historical insight intersect. The theory-ladeness of each tribe’s vocabulary, even within our little discipline, is getting in the way. "But naturalizing the relationships between technical componentry and biological form is offensive and problematic to many of us who spend our academic careers trying to deconstruct the "obviousness" of these relationships, and the discrimination and heteronormativity they perpetuate” Ironic, no? Since Nature was the referrent for plugs and sockets in the first place. Hey, let’s all take a deep breath! Vigorous back and forth should be sometihng to celebrate! :_) Dag — Dag Spicer Senior Curator Computer History Museum 1401 N Shoreline Blvd Mountain View, CA 94043 On May 24, 2017, at 4:04 PM, Laine Nooney <laine.nooney@gmail.com<mailto:laine.nooney@gmail.com>> wrote: Dag, I get where you're coming from. But naturalizing the relationships between technical componentry and biological form is offensive and problematic to many of us who spend our academic careers trying to deconstruct the "obviousness" of these relationships, and the discrimination and heteronormativity they perpetuate. There's a whole different discourse gender studies folks are appealing to here, one that is painfully under-read within the history of technology. (And the fact that it can be under-read, that many don't feel obliged to be well read on these subjects, is part of the systemic problem). I imagine I don't just speak for myself when I suggest that the past few days have been trying and exhausting for many of us, participants and lurkers alike. I don't want to make appeals to civility or generosity, but I am honestly at a loss for how to engage this listserv any further at the moment. -L On Wed, May 24, 2017 at 6:26 PM Dag Spicer <dspicer@computerhistory.org<mailto:dspicer@computerhistory.org>> wrote: "There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents.” Really? Look up "male + female connectors" on Google images and see if you can figure it out. Completely obvious. Completely literal. BTW, to call Paul Edwards ‘uninformed’ is pretty rich. Respectfully, Dag — Dag Spicer Senior Curator Computer History Museum 1401 N Shoreline Blvd Mountain View, CA 94043 On May 24, 2017, at 3:17 PM, pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu><mailto:pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote: Yes. Scholars should be respectful of each other. Sent by my iPhone. Don't blame me. On May 24, 2017, at 18:15, Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu><mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>>> wrote: This response speaks for itself. It certainly would be great if more women felt as if they could chime in. But only if they are properly respectful (i.e don't proffer critiques). I have nothing more to add here. -M Sent from my iPhone On May 24, 2017, at 4:58 PM, Paul N.Edwards <pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu><mailto:pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>>> wrote: All, in response to Miriam’s post: I did not say that mammals have gender. My post could certainly have been clearer about the difference between sex (the relevant metaphor in the cases I mentioned) and gender as a social construction. Anyone who knows my work will realize that I am one of the many people, of all genders, who have worked tirelessly for the last 35 years to promote attention to gender studies, to women, to race, and to LGBT issues in the history of computing. So I am hardly “uninformed” on this subject. If anyone is curious, I will be happy to provide a long list of bona fides offline. This thread started with Caitlin’s query about gendered terms in engineering. It was a question seeking answers. The replies on this thread may have come mostly from men, but all were courteous, friendly, and clearly intended to be thoughtful contributions to a scholarly discussion. I apologize if something in my post was offensive, but I reject the idea that men commenting on gender issues is somehow out of line. Of course it would be great if more women would chime in. Let’s please return this discussion to its previous respectful tone. Best, Paul On May 24, 2017, at 11:58 , Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu><mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>>> wrote: Hi Folks, Two thoughts here: Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents. Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever. Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies. Miriam E. Sweeney Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies The University of Alabama<https://www.ua.edu/> 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522<tel:(205)%20348-1522><tel:205-348-1522<tel:(205)%20348-1522>> mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu><mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>> | https://slis.ua.edu/ On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu><mailto:pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>>> wrote: Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965. It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian. “Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity). “Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian. This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships. Best, Paul On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net<mailto:mike@willegal.net><mailto:mike@willegal.net<mailto:mike@willegal.net>>> wrote: My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it". cheers, Mike Willegal On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com<mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com><mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com<mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com>>> wrote: Hi Caitlin, I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg: Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves." Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks." And there's this<http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf> unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey. I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested. Cheers, Mark On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu<mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu><mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu<mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu>>> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study! I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way. The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!) In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies. - Bill ________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org<mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org><mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org<mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org>>] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu<mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu><mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu<mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu>>] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org<mailto:members@SIGCIS.org><mailto:members@SIGCIS.org<mailto:members@SIGCIS.org>> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard" Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies. Thank you! All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>>> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/ _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/> Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu><mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu>> Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617<tel:(734)%20764-2617> (office) (206) 337-1523<tel:(206)%20337-1523> (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu<http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/><http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/> Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu><mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu>> Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617<tel:(734)%20764-2617> (office) (206) 337-1523<tel:(206)%20337-1523> (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu<http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/><http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org -- Laine Nooney www.lainenooney.com<http://www.lainenooney.com/> DM<http://dm.lmc.gatech.edu/> @ LMC<http://lmc.gatech.edu/> @ GT<http://www.gatech.edu/> Assistant Professor

Hi folks, On the matter of connectors I strongly second Laine: at this point, scholarship in sex, gender, sexuality, queer and trans studies distinguishes between the anatomical characteristics of human organs (to which I take it Dag is referring) and a person's gender, sex, or sexuality — all four characteristics are separate elements of a person and all four are *also* performed as social, cultural, and ideological constructs in particular embodied contexts. As Mara rightly observes, this is a incredibly rich, complex field of scholarship spanning multiple disciplines (and around which scholars in the aforementioned disciplines of course have disagreements themselves) — but a field of scholarship that seeks to adequately represent and explore the reality of these diverse, heterogeneous aspects of our lives as embodied material and social beings. So it follows that I also strongly second and add myself in with the folks who’ve written in support of SIGCIS as an organization exploring the intersections of sex, gender, sexuality, queer and trans studies with computing, given that computing cuts across myriad aspects of lived experience. Happily, I know many, many people doing that work who’ve not chimed in on these threads, and that goal has been espoused, in one form or another, by almost all the folks who’ve commented here. What’s disheartening for me, as it is for others here, is a sense from some folks that there’s a “right” answer about how to direct these intellectual and professional efforts, and by extension that expertise and judgement - what we as trained historians profess we have, at least in some limited way — are not being accorded equal weight depending on the type of expertise being brought to bear. Brian, your work on PLATO engages with a particular set of evidence via a particular flavour of historical method; Joy’s engages with another set with a related by different flavour of historical method. Can we really expect anything else in a field as messy as history? Isn’t that okay? The poet Robert Lowell wrote that “History has to live with what was here/clutching and close to fumbling all we had.” The gap between “what was here” in all its complicated and sometimes contradictory weight and the histories we as individual historians produce is always a challenging one, but it’s especially challenging when it becomes clear that “all we had” is much, much more than we had traditionally thought. I make this point with all due regard for careful and methodical historical work - but also with the sense, to second Gerardo’s point in an earlier message, that the participants in historical events only have one subjective perspective on them. I’d add that our embodied positions (not just around sex, gender or race, but also age, status in the profession, financial security, etc) place us at different points in a hierarchy of received expectations around authority that determine how and in what ways we interpret evidence and present it, and even what emotions we can engage in when we respond on this list (politely, angrily, ironically, etc) — and I say that with profound awareness of being a very junior scholar weighing in among eminent and senior ones. I’m all in favour of confronting these professional and intellectual hierarchies head on in ways that recognize the fruitfulness inherent in how much more scholarship on these topics there is to do. Best to all, Luke

On May 24, 2017, at 4:04 PM, Laine Nooney <laine.nooney@gmail.com> wrote:

Dag, I get where you're coming from. But naturalizing the relationships between technical componentry and biological form is offensive and problematic to many of us who spend our academic careers trying to deconstruct the "obviousness" of these relationships, and the discrimination and heteronormativity they perpetuate. There's a whole different discourse gender studies folks are appealing to here, one that is painfully under-read within the history of technology. (And the fact that it can be under-read, that many don't feel obliged to be well read on these subjects, is part of the systemic problem).

I imagine I don't just speak for myself when I suggest that the past few days have been trying and exhausting for many of us, participants and lurkers alike. I don't want to make appeals to civility or generosity, but I am honestly at a loss for how to engage this listserv any further at the moment.

-L

On Wed, May 24, 2017 at 6:26 PM Dag Spicer <dspicer@computerhistory.org <mailto:dspicer@computerhistory.org>> wrote: "There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents.”

Really?

Look up "male + female connectors" on Google images and see if you can figure it out. Completely obvious. Completely literal.

BTW, to call Paul Edwards ‘uninformed’ is pretty rich.

Respectfully,

Dag — Dag Spicer Senior Curator Computer History Museum 1401 N Shoreline Blvd Mountain View, CA 94043

On May 24, 2017, at 3:17 PM, pne@umich.edu <mailto:pne@umich.edu><mailto:pne@umich.edu <mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote:

Yes. Scholars should be respectful of each other.

Sent by my iPhone. Don't blame me.

On May 24, 2017, at 18:15, Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu <mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu><mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu <mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>>> wrote:

This response speaks for itself. It certainly would be great if more women felt as if they could chime in. But only if they are properly respectful (i.e don't proffer critiques). I have nothing more to add here.

-M

Sent from my iPhone On May 24, 2017, at 4:58 PM, Paul N.Edwards <pne@umich.edu <mailto:pne@umich.edu><mailto:pne@umich.edu <mailto:pne@umich.edu>>> wrote:

All, in response to Miriam’s post:

I did not say that mammals have gender. My post could certainly have been clearer about the difference between sex (the relevant metaphor in the cases I mentioned) and gender as a social construction.

Anyone who knows my work will realize that I am one of the many people, of all genders, who have worked tirelessly for the last 35 years to promote attention to gender studies, to women, to race, and to LGBT issues in the history of computing. So I am hardly “uninformed” on this subject. If anyone is curious, I will be happy to provide a long list of bona fides offline.

This thread started with Caitlin’s query about gendered terms in engineering. It was a question seeking answers. The replies on this thread may have come mostly from men, but all were courteous, friendly, and clearly intended to be thoughtful contributions to a scholarly discussion.

I apologize if something in my post was offensive, but I reject the idea that men commenting on gender issues is somehow out of line. Of course it would be great if more women would chime in.

Let’s please return this discussion to its previous respectful tone.

Best,

Paul

On May 24, 2017, at 11:58 , Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu <mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu><mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu <mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>>> wrote:

Hi Folks,

Two thoughts here:

Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents.

Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever.

Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies.

Miriam E. Sweeney

Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies

The University of Alabama<https://www.ua.edu/ <https://www.ua.edu/>> 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522 <tel:(205)%20348-1522><tel:205-348-1522 <tel:(205)%20348-1522>> mesweeney1@ua.edu <mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu><mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu <mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>> | https://slis.ua.edu/ <https://slis.ua.edu/>

On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu <mailto:pne@umich.edu><mailto:pne@umich.edu <mailto:pne@umich.edu>>> wrote:

Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965.

It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian.

“Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity).

“Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian.

This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships.

Best,

Paul

On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net <mailto:mike@willegal.net><mailto:mike@willegal.net <mailto:mike@willegal.net>>> wrote:

My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it".

cheers, Mike Willegal

On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com <mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com><mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com <mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com>>> wrote:

Hi Caitlin,

I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg:

Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves."

Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks."

And there's this<http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf <http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf>> unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey.

I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested.

Cheers, Mark

On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu <mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu><mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu <mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu>>> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study!

I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way.

The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!)

In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies.

- Bill

________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org <mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org><mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org <mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org>>] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu <mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu><mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu <mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu>>] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org<mailto:members@SIGCIS.org <mailto:members@SIGCIS.org>> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard"

Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies.

Thank you!

All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>>> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/ <http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/ <http://sigcis.org/>>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/ <http://sigcis.org/>>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/ <http://sigcis.org/>>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/ <http://www.si.umich.edu/>> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/ <http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/>> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/ <http://graham.umich.edu/>> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/ <http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/>>

Starting July 1, 2017:

William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu <mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu><mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu <mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu>>

Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/ <http://five.sentenc.es/>>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/ <http://emailcharter.org/>>

University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/ <http://www.si.umich.edu/>> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 <tel:(734)%20764-2617> (office) (206) 337-1523 <tel:(206)%20337-1523> (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu <http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/><http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/ <http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/>>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/ <http://sigcis.org/>>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/ <http://sigcis.org/>>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/ <http://www.si.umich.edu/>> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/ <http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/>> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/ <http://graham.umich.edu/>> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/ <http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/>>

Starting July 1, 2017:

William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu <mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu><mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu <mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu>>

Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/ <http://five.sentenc.es/>>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/ <http://emailcharter.org/>>

University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/ <http://www.si.umich.edu/>> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 <tel:(734)%20764-2617> (office) (206) 337-1523 <tel:(206)%20337-1523> (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu <http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/><http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/ <http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/>>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/ <http://sigcis.org/>>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/ <http://sigcis.org/>>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org> -- Laine Nooney www.lainenooney.com <http://www.lainenooney.com/>

DM <http://dm.lmc.gatech.edu/> @ LMC <http://lmc.gatech.edu/> @ GT <http://www.gatech.edu/> Assistant Professor _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

Really? I don’t get that result on Google. It shows electrical componentry, which was my intention. Wiki can shed some light here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_of_connectors_and_fasteners "The assignment is a direct analogy<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analogy> with genitalia<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genitalia> and heterosexual<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heterosexual> sexual intercourse<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_intercourse>; the part bearing one or more protrusions<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protrusion>, or which fits inside the other, being designated male<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Male> in contrast to the part containing the corresponding indentations, or fitting outside the other, being designated female<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female>. Extension of the analogy results in the verb to mate<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mating> being used to describe the process of connecting two corresponding parts together.” I think this would work within your biological reference frame as well. Note also, it’s not all about the heterosphere: "Devices used for mating two connectors of the same gender have a wide variety of terms, including for example: "gender changer<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_changer>", "gender mender", "gender bender", "gender blender", "sex changer", and "homosexual adapter.” And even (sic!) *genderless” connectors, “hermaphroditic,” as my colleague Al Kossow posted recently. Best, Dag — Dag Spicer Senior Curator Computer History Museum 1401 N Shoreline Blvd Mountain View, CA 94043 On May 24, 2017, at 4:43 PM, Mara Mills <mmills@nyu.edu<mailto:mmills@nyu.edu>> wrote: This comment is vulgar. I performed the Google image search as you advised, Dag, and I don't see what I presume you want me to see: human penises and vaginas? As someone originally trained in biology (BA UCSC, MA Harvard), I don't have an essential image in my mind of what "male" and "female" look like. In the life sciences, these terms have been applied -- often dubiously -- far beyond the animal kingdom. This is a subject of debate within biology proper, as it should be in the history of technology. Even if "male" and "female" are "readily understood" categories for certain men on this list (and/or in the field of engineering), we should still want to know their histories within particular technical subfields. BECAUSE WE ARE HISTORIANS. I've spent the last several years researching the history of "impairment" and similar disability-related words as applied in telegraphy and telephony (and later, signal processing in general). As I assume most of my colleagues on this list understand, it is the "obvious" concepts that require our most careful attention as historians. respectfully, Mara On Wed, May 24, 2017 at 6:26 PM, Dag Spicer <dspicer@computerhistory.org<mailto:dspicer@computerhistory.org>> wrote: "There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents.” Really? Look up "male + female connectors" on Google images and see if you can figure it out. Completely obvious. Completely literal. BTW, to call Paul Edwards ‘uninformed’ is pretty rich. Respectfully, Dag — Dag Spicer Senior Curator Computer History Museum 1401 N Shoreline Blvd Mountain View, CA 94043 On May 24, 2017, at 3:17 PM, pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu><mailto:pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote: Yes. Scholars should be respectful of each other. Sent by my iPhone. Don't blame me. On May 24, 2017, at 18:15, Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu><mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>>> wrote: This response speaks for itself. It certainly would be great if more women felt as if they could chime in. But only if they are properly respectful (i.e don't proffer critiques). I have nothing more to add here. -M Sent from my iPhone On May 24, 2017, at 4:58 PM, Paul N.Edwards <pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu><mailto:pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>>> wrote: All, in response to Miriam’s post: I did not say that mammals have gender. My post could certainly have been clearer about the difference between sex (the relevant metaphor in the cases I mentioned) and gender as a social construction. Anyone who knows my work will realize that I am one of the many people, of all genders, who have worked tirelessly for the last 35 years to promote attention to gender studies, to women, to race, and to LGBT issues in the history of computing. So I am hardly “uninformed” on this subject. If anyone is curious, I will be happy to provide a long list of bona fides offline. This thread started with Caitlin’s query about gendered terms in engineering. It was a question seeking answers. The replies on this thread may have come mostly from men, but all were courteous, friendly, and clearly intended to be thoughtful contributions to a scholarly discussion. I apologize if something in my post was offensive, but I reject the idea that men commenting on gender issues is somehow out of line. Of course it would be great if more women would chime in. Let’s please return this discussion to its previous respectful tone. Best, Paul On May 24, 2017, at 11:58 , Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu><mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>>> wrote: Hi Folks, Two thoughts here: Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents. Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever. Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies. Miriam E. Sweeney Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies The University of Alabama<https://www.ua.edu/> 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522<tel:205-348-1522><tel:205-348-1522<tel:205-348-1522>> mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu><mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>> | https://slis.ua.edu/ On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu><mailto:pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>>> wrote: Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965. It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian. “Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity). “Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian. This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships. Best, Paul On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net<mailto:mike@willegal.net><mailto:mike@willegal.net<mailto:mike@willegal.net>>> wrote: My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it". cheers, Mike Willegal On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com<mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com><mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com<mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com>>> wrote: Hi Caitlin, I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg: Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves." Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks." And there's this<http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf> unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey. I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested. Cheers, Mark On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu<mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu><mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu<mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu>>> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study! I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way. The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!) In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies. - Bill ________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org<mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org><mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org<mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org>>] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu<mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu><mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu<mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu>>] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org<mailto:members@SIGCIS.org><mailto:members@SIGCIS.org<mailto:members@SIGCIS.org>> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard" Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies. Thank you! All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>>> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/ _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/> Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu><mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu>> Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617<tel:%28734%29%20764-2617> (office) (206) 337-1523<tel:%28206%29%20337-1523> (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu<http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/><http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/> Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu><mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu>> Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617<tel:%28734%29%20764-2617> (office) (206) 337-1523<tel:%28206%29%20337-1523> (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu<http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/><http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/><http://sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org -- Mara Mills | Associate Professor | Media, Culture, and Communication | New York University http://maramills.org/ Co-Director, NYU Disability Council https://wp.nyu.edu/disability_council/

Women may respond, provided it is in the "previously respectful tone", but unless they have a "long list of bona fides" proving their qualifications to speak on the subjection of women, we should really just trust the expert. Regards, Wesley On May 24, 2017, at 5:15 PM, Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>> wrote: This response speaks for itself. It certainly would be great if more women felt as if they could chime in. But only if they are properly respectful (i.e don't proffer critiques). I have nothing more to add here. -M Sent from my iPhone On May 24, 2017, at 4:58 PM, Paul N.Edwards <pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote: All, in response to Miriam’s post: I did not say that mammals have gender. My post could certainly have been clearer about the difference between sex (the relevant metaphor in the cases I mentioned) and gender as a social construction. Anyone who knows my work will realize that I am one of the many people, of all genders, who have worked tirelessly for the last 35 years to promote attention to gender studies, to women, to race, and to LGBT issues in the history of computing. So I am hardly “uninformed” on this subject. If anyone is curious, I will be happy to provide a long list of bona fides offline. This thread started with Caitlin’s query about gendered terms in engineering. It was a question seeking answers. The replies on this thread may have come mostly from men, but all were courteous, friendly, and clearly intended to be thoughtful contributions to a scholarly discussion. I apologize if something in my post was offensive, but I reject the idea that men commenting on gender issues is somehow out of line. Of course it would be great if more women would chime in. Let’s please return this discussion to its previous respectful tone. Best, Paul On May 24, 2017, at 11:58 , Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu>> wrote: Hi Folks, Two thoughts here: Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents. Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever. Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies. Miriam E. Sweeney Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies The University of Alabama<https://www.ua.edu/> 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522<tel:205-348-1522> mesweeney1@ua.edu<mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu> | https://slis.ua.edu/ On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu<mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote: Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965. It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian. “Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity). “Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian. This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships. Best, Paul On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net<mailto:mike@willegal.net>> wrote: My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it". cheers, Mike Willegal On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com<mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com>> wrote: Hi Caitlin, I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg: Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves." Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks." And there's this<http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf> unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey. I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested. Cheers, Mark On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu<mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu>> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study! I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way. The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!) In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies. - Bill ________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org<mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org>] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu<mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu>] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org<mailto:members@SIGCIS.org> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard" Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies. Thank you! All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu<mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/ _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/> Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu> Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu<http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History<http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute<http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows<http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/> Starting July 1, 2017: William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu<mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu> Terse replies are deliberate<http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why! <http://emailcharter.org/> University of Michigan School of Information<http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu<http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/> _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

Dr. Sweeney, A comment on your second paragraph below. To be clear, what was taken to task was a series of misrepresentations and insinuations about historical facts about the PLATO system and the people who used it, not "a woman scholar for presenting informed research on gender in computing.” However tempting it is to spin my article as an attack on a scholar, it was and is not: it is an evidence-backed challenge to what the scholar claimed. It is dismaying how swiftly a few members of SIGCIS want to dismiss a challenge to questionable historical research on PLATO as a “messy display of intellectual territorialism.” It is also somewhat dismaying how many historians of computing (who were quite active on this list for months on end in challenging the questionable claims of the so-called inventor of email) have stayed silent this week. - Brian Brian Dear PLATO History Project Santa Fe, NM

On May 24, 2017, at 9:58 AM, Sweeney, Miriam <mesweeney1@ua.edu> wrote:

Hi Folks,

Two thoughts here:

Firstly, mammals don’t have gender (a socially constructed concept reflecting ideas about masculinity and femininity). There is nothing obvious or literal about the metaphor of “female” and “male” connectors- they are indeed ideological referents.

Secondly, I can’t help but read this thread in direct contrast to the thread criticizing Rankin’s talk. I note that on the latter thread a woman scholar is being taken to task for presenting informed research on gender in computing, while on this thread we have male scholars hazarding uninformed guesses about gender and computing metaphors with no pushback whatsoever.

Reading these threads side by side has definitely given me pause on the state of the field and the challenges we continue to have for fully integrating cultural studies, gender, and race perspectives into information and computing studies.

Miriam E. Sweeney Assistant Professor , School of Library and Information Studies

The University of Alabama <https://www.ua.edu/> 527 Gorgas Box 870252 Tuscaloosa , AL office 205-348-1522 <tel:205-348-1522> mesweeney1@ua.edu <mailto:mesweeney1@ua.edu> | https://slis.ua.edu/ <https://slis.ua.edu/>

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:51 AM, Paul N. Edwards <pne@umich.edu <mailto:pne@umich.edu>> wrote:

Interesting discussion. OED does not speculate on this connection; first use of “motherboard” it lists is 1965.

It’s worth noting that some of the gendered terms in engineering are very clear and literal metaphors, not specifically human though definitely mammalian.

“Mother ship,” like “motherboard,” refers to a larger thing from which smaller, but similar dependent units (smaller ships, subsidiary circuit boards) are launched, to which they are attached, and from which they draw sustenance (fuel, electricity).

“Female” and “male” connectors refer to sockets and plugs respectively, also quite literal, also not particularly human but mammalian.

This is not to say that such metaphors aren’t sometimes deployed in objectionable, human-oriented ways, but it would be silly to ignore their value as readily understood descriptors of physical structure and/or relationships.

Best,

Paul

...

On May 24, 2017, at 9:43 , mike willegal <mike@willegal.net <mailto:mike@willegal.net>> wrote:

My guess is that the term, Motherboard, was derived from the term Mothership, which is still in common usage by the general population, and according to several online dictionaries originated in the 19th century. Note that when techs and engineers refer to Motherboards, they normally use the gender neutral pronoun, "it".

cheers, Mike Willegal

...

On May 23, 2017, at 1:51 PM, Mark Priestley <m.priestley@gmail.com <mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com>> wrote:

Hi Caitlin,

I'm not sure if this is the sort of thing you're looking for, but some CS pioneers were rather keen to use the master-slave metaphor to talk about human-computer relations. Eg:

Jack Good reported that: "Turing used to refer jocularly to people who are forced to do mechanical operations as slaves."

Bardini quotes Engelbart: "Think ahead to the day when computer technology might provide for your very own use the full-time services of a completely attentive, very patient, very fast symbol-manipulating slave who has an IQ adequate for 95% of your today's mental tasks."

And there's this <http://markpriestley.net/pdfs/Huskey.pdf> unfortunate Newsweek caption about Harry Huskey.

I think probably links back to earlier tropes about robots: eg in Capek's RUR, the rebellious robots are precisely slaves. I've got an unpublished conference paper I wrote a few years back about this which I could dig out if you're interested.

Cheers, Mark

On 23 May 2017 at 18:29, McMillan, William W <william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu <mailto:william.mcmillan@cuaa.edu>> wrote: Caitlin, this is an interesting study!

I'm not sure, though, if "today's engineers" would very readily coin gender-specific terms for parts of computers. These terms go back a long way.

The "master-slave" terminology has going for it that the relationship between, say, a bus arbiter and connected devices is, in truth, a master-slave relationship. The other connotations make it hard for me to use the terms in class, but it's difficult to find synonyms. Controller-controlled? Decider-doer? Kind of awkward. (Suggestions welcome!)

In contrast to the gendered terms, in describing the tree data structure, the relationship between nodes has always been parent-child, back at least to Knuth's volumes, not father-son, mother-son, or the like. Same with object/class hierarchies.

- Bill

________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org <mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org>] on behalf of Wylie, Caitlin Donahue (cdw9y) [cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu <mailto:cdw9y@eservices.virginia.edu>] Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:11 PM To: members@SIGCIS.org <mailto:members@SIGCIS.org> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] History of gendered terms, e.g., "motherboard"

Dear all, Do you know of any studies of gendered language in computing? I’m intrigued by the way today’s engineers throw around words like “motherboard” and “daughterboard”, and also “master” and “slave”, without being aware of how those words sound to non-engineers (like me). I’d be interested in learning about historical or sociological studies.

Thank you!

All the best, Caitlin Wylie _______________________ Caitlin D. Wylie, Ph.D. Assistant Professor Program in Science, Technology and Society University of Virginia wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu><mailto:wylie@virginia.edu <mailto:wylie@virginia.edu>> http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/ <http://www.eands.virginia.edu/faculty-staff/wylie/>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

---

This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org> ————————————————— Paul N. Edwards Professor of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/> and History <http://www.lsa.umich.edu/history/> Distinguished Faculty in Sustainability, Graham Sustainability Institute <http://graham.umich.edu/> Senior Fellow, Michigan Society of Fellows <http://societyoffellows.umich.edu/>

Starting July 1, 2017:

William J. Perry Fellow in International Security Center for International Security and Cooperation Stanford University pedwards@stanford.edu <mailto:pedwards@stanford.edu>

Terse replies are deliberate <http://five.sentenc.es/>. Here's why!  <http://emailcharter.org/>

University of Michigan School of Information <http://www.si.umich.edu/> 4437 North Quad 105 S. State Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285 (734) 764-2617 (office) (206) 337-1523 (fax) pne.people.si.umich.edu <http://pne.people.si.umich.edu/>

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org <http://sigcis.org/>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ <http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/> and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org <http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org>

---

This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org