3/30 Class Notes

Panel 1: Introductions

Vgaffney: representing psychiatrists in 21st century. It’s a relatively new field that bridges an interesting gap between social and natural sciences. Physics in imaging of mapping brains and medications (chemistry), biology and anatomy, studies and statistics about how many women in the field 20% in 70s to this field is said to be more suited to women

Cara- workers and inhabitants of guiyu in china which used to be a small farming town but in 1995 they began the process of disassembling e-waste from developed countries. People make $8-$12 a day to take apart old electronics, etc. the more people in other parts of the world became aware that this was happening, the more regulated the process became. A lot of e-waste is very toxic and in order to access reusable precious metals workers often must inhale toxic fumes. In this town the information is tied to the hardware, what is the whole life cycle of the technology?

Sprestion- facebook users (high school and college users) using technology to create their own identity. More psychiatrists are noticing facebook depression, kids having different impressions of themselves because of facebook. Looking at information and gender roles and binaries this creates

MSA322- growing up in the Arabic world, it’s really interesting to look at how we’ve used music in a lot of ways to reach out to western world and send messages, the intersection with gender is that singers are usually male but a female singer in a revolution would have a stronger impact on the song, decoding music and sending info to the world

Hilary brashear- midwives are a mixture of science and medicine but also ritual and spirituality of birth, entanglements with political realm, in US they are stigmatized, how do we view birth? Something that takes place in a hospital, they see it as more of a celebration but they do have degrees in nursing and health

Kelliot- cyberpunks, a group of sience fiction writers who focus on high tech and low life, thought of as opposite of utopic stories of 40’s and 50’s- cybernetics- replacing human function with computers and punk, genre of music. They focus on engaging thought between the humanitites and social sciences and breaking down elite perspective. Focus on female cyborgs. They use a lot of information technology, computers and hackers, utilizing technology rather than seeing it as a bad thing.

Jlebouvier- Wampanoag nation, making contact with pilgrims, shared farming technologies and systems of lineage (matrilineal) were very interesting to settlers, interactions founded in fact that they had met European traders and spoke some English and French.

Jyoo- users of reddit.com a social news website, users can post about anything, others can comment, also can vote on any post on any basis. Focuses on information and how it’s interpreted by different people. Each post incorporates many different views.

Anne's oldest daughter is going to eat her placenta. Her daughter in law is going to be a psychiatrist, which is not highly regarded in the medical profession.

kgould- facebook users, wampanoags, and arab world music- worldwide communications affect identity in a good way? bad way? matrilineal issues, a female singer is more emotionally powerful- interest in passing online. with communication through technology how does that affect things

aybala- us immigrants are going to jump in

jlebouvier- meeting other europeans usually caused disease, so the wamp population dwindled severely. decades later, the matrilineal system started to break down.

liz- clarify matrilineal system

jlebouvier- instead of fathers passing land, etc to sons, the woman is the head of the family and owns all the land and property and passes it to daughters. so that broke down once europeans came over and ruined it.

MSA322- from recent revolutions in egypt and tunisia, i don't keep up with the news, and one of my friends is very into that and she posted a lot of videos on facebook so that's how I knew what was going on, and I'd see music videos on my friend's pages and that's how I'd know how they felt about it and what message they wanted to send. they can be activists using facebook and the internet to make people aware. 

hilary brashear- are the songs in english?

msa- they used to be in arabic, now they are mixed, or translated.

spreston- facebook can make you aware of what's going on, but it doesn't help you meet new people so in a lot of ways it prevents branching out

aybala- concerning us immigrants, when people first started coming to the us, you didn't necessarily stay in touch. now with technology, there is less need to assimilate to US culture, schools are started to adapt, there is a school in Texas changing the school year so they have time off in the farming season so they can go back to Mexico and work with their families. 

anne- another interestng connection is viruses, internet viruses, immigrants in history facing virus or bringing them in 

liz- to redditors, is there a lot of independent news sharing? folks in tunisia sending direct accounts of what's happening? what kind of news is shared on the site?

jyoo- they keep up to date with things like japan, or reposted articles from news sites, but a lot of the news is a lot less serious. 

merlin- the transmission of information from ordinary people out into the world vs news media/censorship, what are drawbacks to anyone being able to go online and say whatever they want to the world? 

jyoo- there are trolls out there, reddit is liberal so there's not much of a conservative point of view

ekthorp- the use of popular websites is part of why we use so many electronics, how do you feel about sites that create more electronic users and thus more waste?

cara- because we have the information, we need the hardware, and it's advancing so fast we are generating more waste. but limiting the information isn't the way to limit waste. just making them more recyclable would help. 

kgould- political and cultural issues with technology, how would a cyberpunk author interpret what's happening in china? 

kelliot- they use the literature to call readers to action, saying there's no distinction between man and machine.

liz- you mentioned high tech low life, how do the people doing the work in china fit in?

anne- maybe you don't have enough information about china

liz- cara, what info would you like to be told on behalf of the workers?

PANEL 2

fawei- scientists of human genome project, 13 year project with the goal to idenify all possible human genes, more or less finished in 2003. the scientists discovered, stored, and distributed all the info. although science and tech was already advanced, there's a problem with the way the info is used. gene info can be used in many ways, ideally to help medicine and predict diseases, etc and also in agricultural modification but people are looking to do things like patent genes and ethical problems that arise from using genes to predict people's behavior. biological determinism is important here.

anne- we know less than we thought we would when the project finished

kgould- female gamers, most gamers are male, but that is changing. 40% of the gaming population is female in 2010, majority of online gamers are women and they play more frequently but men play for longer durations. most women like to play solo. extreme gamers- more than 40 hours a week is slowly gaining women as well. make up half the market for games. through the lens of reality is broken 

anne- so glad to see this stepped off of a presentation from last time

oak- female science fiction writers are becoming more prevalent, field has broadened. more things are included

ekthorp-nerdfighters are the title given to people who are dedicated followers of blog brothers, a youtube channel founded by brothers living far apart keeping in touch. they are the 97th most followed youtube channel, they are youtube famous ( a new term). they post many different videos including informational videos where they answer questions asked by followers. 2/3 of subscribers are women, they comment a lot on that. they host concerts to raise money for Haiti, etc. 

anne- is youtube fame a cure for facebook depression?

merlin- first tool users incorporate technology and gender roles, indicates intelligence in a species, a greater demand for use of technology was related to brain size

anne- time is up, are tools male specific?

merlin- in order to hunt and provide food and resources, yes. 

smile- young voices behind arab revolutions, many groups organized online first, 

riki- neurotypical syndrome characterized by delusions of superiority, obsession with conformity. 96% of people. started by autistic community who did not want to be placed in a different community. autism is a spectrum disorder, which implies that everyone would fall on the spectrum in some way, why is there a distinction between autistics and neurotypicals? 

marina- deaf community in relation to access of information, not necessarily genetic. severe hearing loss who don't use sign language but enhance hearing using technological means or the culturally deaf, see it not as a disorder but a different way to experience the world. texting and email have emerged as an easy way to communicate. issues of captioning on websites. social networking have created online deaf community. closing gap between hearing and deaf, since we can access all the same information online. 

tiffany e- surgeons, da vinci robotics system of 3D computer screen where the doctor sits and long surgical tools are used to perform surgery, surgeries are very effective and turns surgeons into cyborgs. human sensitivities have been replaced by a computer. complaints of stifling sense of touch, haptic feedback where it vibrates when you touch it

leamirella- female gamers, nerdfighters, arab revolutionaries, facebook as well- a sense of "unreal" online community. what makes a virtual group not real?

smile- virtual vs real group, they don't know each other or take any actions they just talk about ideas

leamirella- i'm trying to break down that distinction between the virtual and the real. 

apo: what about real vs virtual in relation to the senses?

anne- your question is about knowing and how technology extends/reduces our knowing from our senses, like telescopes

smile- is there a gender difference in the deaf community using technology or in the doctors using technology?

tiffany- playing field is level by tools in operating room, training is the same 

sadie- connection of active participants being female and stars being male, why do you think these men have such a large female fan base?

ekthorp- they talk a lot about why they think they have female viewers, and the differences betwene specific videos, they conclude that the age group they appeal to has girls who are more mature and so their videos are more marketable to them. 

anne- there was  science fiction writer who pretended to be male but was female and lost a lot of fame when she came out as a woman

kgould- female gamers are less likely to join communities 

liz- riki, representing neruotypicals, how do they feel about the human genome project? fawei, was one of the motivations in doing the project gaining insight into spectrum disorders like autism/neurotypicality? 

riki- the ideal human that they mapped was perfect and they were chasing this dream of common disease, common variant hypothesis

fawei- neurotypicality would be of interest for us to study