This is the blog for the research project The Geek as gatekeeper? Changing relations between gender, race and technology funded by the Swedish Research Council.
Current initiatives to widen participation in technology are not succeeding and novel research is key to diversifying the field. This project aims to trace how the figuration of ‘the geek’ includes and excludes and how its shifting articulations are transforming available identities in technology education.
Project description
The geek, often derided but also identified as stereotype and gatekeeper of technology in educational research, is on the rise today, increasingly linked to entrepreneurialism and success. Hence, this is study is timely. We break with previous studies in not contending with rejecting the geek, instead exploring the logics at play in gendering and racialising the geek and ‘his’ passion for technology through looking outside formal education.
The four-year project consists of three sub-studies, each analysing a context with both traditional geek representations and spaces where the geek is re-articulated and resisted. These are: Popular culture (film, TV and their viewing); Open source coding/gaming communities (weekend gatherings and on-line); Higher Education (student clubs/events). We will produce data using ethnographic methods including group/individual interviews and participant observation. Our ambition is to deconstruct the geek, locating its conflicting discourses. We will thus shed light on its pluralisation and its gatekeeper role in passionate relationships to technology. Our findings will create openings to widen participation in technology.
The head of the project is Eva Silfver and she is working with Maria Berge, Heather Mendick and Andreas Ottemo. You can follow us on Twitter @GatekeeperGeek