Week 3 Reflection

Lindsay Harris

COMM 3824-01

1/30/19

Comm 3824 Reflection 3

            In this week’s readings, Sedeno defines techno-science as a body of knowledge and organized procedures, a means of solving problems. She then goes on to define STS as a multi-discipline in which scholars examine science and technology issues/problems from different disciplinary perspectives that deal with cultural, political, social, and ethical questions about how science and technology should be developed and how they could be improved. In Haraway’s article, she talks about how feminist objectivity simply means a set of situated knowledges, which is information that reflects a context and originates with a viewpoint. Finally, Backstrand’s article relates civic science to policy and women which need to be thought about with intersectionality.

            Initially, Haraway’s writing confused me, I am not used to authors being so matter of fact when addressing the reasoning behind the way things are theorized. The way all of these articles tied into technology made me think of a television show I recently watched in which an all girl robotics team was looked down upon by their fellow male competitors. They had to work twice as hard just to be ignored, other teams made it a point to antagonize them for doing nothing other than existing. Sadly this is something that is all too realistic when it comes to the real world. Women in politics, were depicted as hysterical instead of passionate and crazy instead of innovative. Now, with Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris as the two leading Democratic candidates for president, I hope that people will begin to see a change. In science and technology, I am less aware of big names, however I am certain that it is still divided by gender stereotypes. In high school I remember that the higher level math classes were filled with boys and contained at most 4 girls. Girls were often not recipients of awards and recognition for no reason other than not being thought of as a scientist or intelligent thinker. I hope that one day, with the help of writers like Haraway and Sedeno, people will give up the misconceptions they hold onto about women in STS.