Course:LIBR559A/Landström, C. (2007)
Citation
Landström, C. (2007). Queering feminist technology studies. Feminist Theory,8(1), 7-26. Retrieved from http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1464700107074193
Purpose of article
The purpose of this article is to move the conversation of gender and technology in society away from heteronormativity and towards a conversation which does not rely on the stability of gender identities.
Main Arguments
Perspectives drawing on queer theory can contribute to a rethinking of gender in this strain of feminist technology studies (Landstrӧm,8).
- feminist constructivist technology studies repeatedly uses heteronormative representations of women, men and technology.
- Feminist theorists have developed a number of ways to think differently about gender, but this has not caught on with the use of the constructivist approach which is often used to explore how technology and gender are co-constructed.
- Heteronormativity influences the way in which gender is represented and discussed in feminist constructivist technology studies. There is no questioning of the definition of gender as “a heterosexual coupling of opposites” (Landstrӧm, 10)The author then provides many examples of studies which commit this mistake which weakens their arguments including that of the well-known Judith Butler and her notion of ‘heterosexual matrix’.
By adopting the queer theory understanding of gender and sexuality ethnographic studies of gender and technology would benefit, “since it would strive to ‘mobilize and transform the position of women, the alignment of forces that constitute that “identity” and “position,” that stratification which stabilizes itself as a place and an identity” (Landstrӧm, 18).
Method
This is a thought piece in which the author uses cases studies of ethnographies of producers and users of technology as examples to explain their criticism of the use of feminist theory in the study of gender and technology.
Areas / Topics / Keywords
Constructivism, feminist technology studies, gender and Technology, queer theory
Key Concepts
Heteronormativity – “the view that institutionalised heterosexuality constitutes the standard for legitimate and expected social and sexual relations” (Landstrӧm,10).
Queer theory – a theory which ‘disturb a;; sexual boundaries, and create sexual mayhem, so that any individual may occupy or perform any sexual or gender identity…(Landstrӧm,18).”
Feminist constructivist technology theory- a sub-field of feminist theory which relies on ethnographic methods to analyse gender in relation to the construction and use of technology.
Theoretical Frameworks
This article is not structured with a theoretical framework; however it does discuss feminist technology theory, and feminist constructivist theory as well as how the study of gender and technology would be better suited framed in queer theory.
Novel Ideas Introduced
What is interesting about Landstrӧm’s approach to reframing constructivist feminist theory is that they do not seek to totally replace feminist study of technology with queer study of technology, but to marry the understanding of gender and sexuality from queer studies with the objectives of feminist theory.
Contribution to Scholarship
This article contributes to the study of gender and technology by building on the existing historiography and bridging the discussion from a framing in feminist theory to that of queer theory whilst maintaining the objectives of the feminist research.
Link
http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1464700107074193
Page Author: Pauline Richer