A Critical Reflection on Research on Gender, IT and Learning – intersections of pleasures and challenges of interdisciplinary research

In English GLIT
Learning Lund and Centre for Gender Studies
Lund University, Sweden
Sara [dot] Goodman [at] genus [dot] lu [dot] se

Abstract for Symposium Gender, IT and Learning, Helsingborg 23 -25 August 2007
This paper is a critical and personal reflection over developments in wide a dynamic research area - Gender, IT (ICT) and Learning. It aims to give a critical reflection on themes and issues that are the fields of study - feminist/ gender studies, social and historical studies of technology and science and the field of learning particularly as regards learning and pedagogy at the university and in working life. The choice of thesefield and of the boundaries of the fields reflect both the interests of the GLIT network and my own personal research interest and academic history. The boundaries of our research and of our research questions are set by many factors – e.g. our disciplines, fields, current dominant paradigms, own intellectual history, availability of research funding and our context. Looking more closely at research on gender, IT and learning may provide a space to discuss future directions for research and how these fields may intersect productively and also look at some or the silences in these fields. In particular this paper will raise issues of intersectionality in the field that is looking at class, racialization, sexuality and gender together.