Feminist talk
Algorithmic discrimination and the feminist politics of being in the data
Global data volume has grown exponentially in recent years and experts expect this trend to continue. The wider trend towards the pervasive datafication of our lives is not one we can just sit out. Big data and the algorithmic decisions it feeds permeate citizenship, healthcare, welfare states, education, finance, law enforcement as well as the ways in which we shop, travel, and live our social…
Feminist talk
Digital Storytelling: All our stories are true and they are ours!
It is a sacred act to tell and to listen to stories. Some of our stories are rooted so deep in our cells, psyches and hearts, that it takes an act of courage to find the words to tell them. We each contain a multitude of stories that shape and make us who we are. It can also be a political act to tell a story. We conceptualise digital story telling as a recording and documentation method which…
Feminist talk
The (mobile) games women play
Games on mobile phones are often a disregarded area of study, because it is relatively cheap and less glamorous than video games. But global consumer spending on mobile gaming in 2015 was estimated to be worth 34.8 billion dollars, and there have been several reports talking about how India is on the ‘verge of a mobile gaming boom’. What the numbers often fail to mention is that a large chunk of…
Feminist talk
Coming Back to Tech
There are a growing number of resources to prevent and respond to many kinds of online harassment faced by women and marginalised people working as activists, human rights defenders or journalists. But what happens 'the day after' an attack? What happens after the more urgent crisis phase(s) of a campaign of harassment passes?
Feminist talk
[COLUMN] The Gender Binary: Thank you!
The word Impostor keeps coming up every time a trans woman writes about herself. It is there, just below the surface, despite all the estrogen and progesterone, under all the skin-colour foundation and pink lipstick and shiny earrings. It is behind the pads on our breast, cushioning the tender nipples. The feeling, and the word - impostor. We are impostors when we try to be us, and when we try to…
Feminist talk
5 reasons why surveillance is a feminist issue
Contemporary surveillance practices are to a large extent big data driven, underpinned by a collect-it-all logic, and ever expanding due to fear-mongering, yet pervasive national security discourse. Surveillance technologies and practices have not only multiplied in scale and quantity. Too often, feminist issues on the one hand, and discussions around privacy and surveillance on the other still…
Feminist talk
Thinking about gender and technology
In South Africa a video recently went viral in which a young woman is gang-raped. This video has re-ignited discussions around gender-based violence within the country, many of these discussions have taken place on social media platforms such as Twitter.
Feminist talk
Gender in the online news: The 2010 GMMP
Since the 1995 conference in Beijing, the Global Media Monitoring Project has provided a snapshot of gender imbalances in the world's media, once every five years. This year, they expanded the coverage from the 'traditional' media to take a look at the internet. Unfortunately, their findings were not encouraging.