Knowledge Production and Gender: A Reading Through Women’s Geographic Information Technology Experiences
The process of knowledge production and actors who produce knowledge from the past to the present is represented by male dominance. The exclusion of women from the knowledge production process and the criticism of the trivialization of the knowledge produced by women have been discussed in the scientific world in the last few decades. The identification of women as emotional and men as rational has made the direction of the relationship between knowledge and gender more visible in the current age of technology and knowledge. In this context, this article discusses the impact of gender roles in knowledge production processes through the experiences of female geographer academics using Geographic Information Technologies. The aim of this research is to examine the effects of gender roles and hierarchies on the knowledge production process and to understand these effects through women’s use of technology. The research was designed according to the qualitative method. The data were obtained through in-depth interviews. The sample of the study comprises female academicians who are GIS users in the discipline of Geography. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with 8 female faculty members working in geography departments in different cities of Turkey. The interviews were conducted online with the researchers and participants. The findings obtained from the interviews reveal that the sexist prejudices that women academics confront in their academic career stories deepen in technology-supported fields and that this situation negatively affects their academic learning and production processes.
Bilgi Üretimi ve Cinsiyet: Kadınların Coğrafi Bilgi Teknolojisi Deneyimleri Üzerinden Bir Okuma
Bilgi üretim süreci ve bilgiyi üreten aktörler geçmişten günümüze erkek egemenliği ile temsil edilmiştir. Kadınların bilgi üretim sürecinden dışlanmaları veya kadınların ürettiği bilginin önemsizleştirilmesine yönelik eleştiriler ise bilim dünyasında son birkaç on yılda tartışmaya açılmıştır. Kadınların duygusallık, erkeklerin ise rasyonellik ile özdeşleştirilmesi içinde bulunduğumuz teknoloji ve bilgi çağında bilgi ile cinsiyet arasındaki ilişkinin yönünü daha görünür hale getirmiştir. Bu kapsamda bu makale, bilgi üretim süreçlerinde toplumsal cinsiyet rollerinin etkisini, Coğrafi Bilgi Teknolojileri’ni kullanan coğrafyacı kadın akademisyenlerin deneyimleri üzerinden tartışmaktadır. Araştırmanın amacı, toplumsal cinsiyet rollerinin ve hiyerarşilerinin bilgi üretim sürecindeki etkisine odaklanarak bu etkileri kadınların teknoloji kullanımı üzerinden anlamaktır. Araştırma, nitel yöntemin fenomenoloji desenine göre tasarlanmıştır. Çalışmaya ilişkin veriler derinlemesine görüşmeler yoluyla elde edilmiştir. Çalışmanın örneklemini Coğrafya disiplinindeki CBS kullanıcısı kadın akademisyenler oluşturmaktadır. Türkiye’nin farklı şehirlerinde yer alan coğrafya bölümlerinde görev yapan 8 kadın öğretim üyesi ile yarı yapılandırılmış derinlemesine görüşmeler yapılmıştır. Görüşmeler araştırmacılar ve katılımcının yer aldığı çevrimiçi ortamda gerçekleştirilmiştir. Görüşmelerden elde edilen bulgular, kadın akademisyenlerin akademik kariyer öykülerinde karşılaştıkları cinsiyetçi önyargıların teknoloji destekli alanlarda daha da derinleştiğini ve bu durumun akademik öğrenme ve üretim süreçlerini olumsuz etkilediğini ortaya koymaktadır.
The mind-body, public-private, culture-nature, and reason-emotion dichotomies, which are seen as the basis of the power hierarchies between women and men, have also defined women as the other of men. In the history of science, those who produce knowledge have mostly been men, and this process of knowledge-production has maintained male dominance. The effect of the male majority and the male perspective on knowledge can also be observed in the discipline of geography. As physical geography is dominated by men, GIS is also associated with sexist assumptions through the masculine coding of technology. Examining the relationship between knowledge production and gender through GIS is based on the implicit assumption that the relationship between technology and gender masculinizes this practice of the discipline.
In the discipline of geography in Turkey, there is a male-dominated process related to the use of GIS. The first publications, the first dissertations, and the first consultants related to GIS were conducted by male geographers, and they are still in the majority today. The findings of this study are based on interviews with 8 female geographers who use Geographic Information Systems extensively in their research. Two thematic headings were identified within the framework of the findings. First is about the otherness of the female body, and second is about how this otherness takes shape when GIS comes into play
According to the participants’ experiences, physical geography is seen for men, while human geography is seen for women. This definition is associated with the idea that women who identify with the naive body can not cope with difficult field conditions. In addition, it is constructed by identifying women with chastity. Furthermore, female physical geographers were associated with the studies on the desk rather than in the field.
Some female geographers avoid fieldwork (in physical geography such as mountains etc.) because of their perception of insecurity. This is certainly due to the masculine coding of physical geography. In this context, altitude is coded as masculine in terms of being strong, steep, and difficult; however flat land plain corresponds to a soft, easily overcome definition. In the participants’ experiences, women geographers are emphasized for their soft, delicate, and gentle identities rather than their scientific identities.
All get worse when GIS is involved. Women geographers who are excluded from technology through practices that construct technology as masculine have also been kept away from geographical information technologies. The participants’ experiences show that male dominance is high in GIS-related practices and excludes women. The participants encountered prejudices about technology being a “man’s thing” when using GIS. Their GIS practices were viewed with suspicion, and the accuracy of their work was questioned. Sometimes, their work is ignored, and they are directed to male GIS users. Another way to exclude women through GIS is by limiting women’s competence by assigning courses to male GIS lecturers.
Women geographers have been excluded from GIS-related knowledge, data sharing, etc. Some participants tried to learn GIS through their own efforts, and some have learned from other fields. The male-dominated structure of GIS practice within the discipline has led women GIS users to engage in interdisciplinary studies.
This study shows that the issues discussed by Monk and Hanson (1982) are still valid in today’s geographic knowledge production. The assumption that technology is masculine and that physical geography is more suitable for male geographers have led to GIS coming to the fore in physical geography. Thus, both have increased masculinity and strengthened women’s otherness in the discipline.
