Developing Women as ICT Users: A Miniature Scoping Review of Gender and ICTs for Development

• In Event: 3167 - Section on Sociology of Development Refereed Roundtables (1 hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: 1. Contemporary Issues in Environment and Social Relations

Abstract

The objective of this research is to gain insight on how the emerging scholarship on gender and ICT4D (information and communications technologies for development) conceptualizes the gender and technology relationship. It is possible that there is room for topical and theoretical expansion in the literature on gender and ICT4D that will better prepare scholars to offer critiques and policy applications that improve gender equity in ICT4D. A constructivist approach is taken to understand the relationship between gender and technology utilizing insights from science and technology studies. Existing theory on the relationship between gender and technology was conceptualized as three categories: women using ICTs as laborers, women using ICTs for leisure, and ICTs as infrastructure impacting women.
Forty-eight articles from four journals (Gender, Technology, and Development, Information Technology for Development, Information Technologies & International Development, and Gender and Development) were coded using an iterative-inductive method. This sample encompassed all issues published between July 2016 and December 2016. Findings suggest scholars are most focused on illuminating how women use ICTs for increased communication and spread of information and increased productivity. Some scholarship focuses on various forms of justice, gender and ICT4D. Other scholarship focuses on cis-gendered fantasies about ICTs. As the field of study matures, more scholars should concentrate on women using ICTs as scientific instruments, ICTs allowing women to participate in outsourced jobs, and ICTs commodifying women.

Authors

• Logan Dawn April Williams, Logan Williams Cons. Scvs.

• Georgia H Artzberger, Michigan State University