From the 2008 Grace Hopper Celebration: "I Am a Technical Woman"

[Triana]

Run time: 02:38 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O293-kmyUj0   Posted on YouTube: September 28, 2009 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: October 02, 2009 By DU Member: Triana Views on DU: 860

 
I Am A Technical Woman

The footage for this video was gathered in the video booth that SAP sponsored at the 2008 Grace Hopper Celebration and we thank them for their support. Our hope for this video is that it will help inspire girls and women everywhere with the wonderful diversity of technical women. This video celebrates everything that is wonderful about all of you. It changes the image of technology by showing the world that women from all over the world belong in technical fields.

Please download this video and share it in classrooms, with your colleagues and with your children. Help us show young women that truly anyone can be a technologist.

If you enjoy the video or show it to a unique group let us know about it. Email us at [e-mail].

Our thanks to SAP for sponsoring the Video Booth at the 2008 Grace Hopper Celebration.

[lapfog_1]

1. I met Admiral Grace Murray Hopper in 1981.

She came to my company to see the Cray 1 that we had installed (serial number 7).

Her only remark about the machine was "it's a dinosaur" (which didn't make management happy at all).

I have a nanosecond from her, which she was famous for handing out at her appearances.

[Triana]

6. R.I.P. Amazing Grace...you were lucky to meet her and to get a nanosecond.

For any women out there looking to be in IT, a programmer or any another math or technical field and find themselves marginalized, sneered at, intimidated, or shut out by the now mostly male-dominated field(s), consider this quote from Grace:

"A ship in a harbor is safe, but that is not what a ship is built for."

MORE about Amazing Grace:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grace_Hopper

It's a shame that these amazing women were relegated to footnotes (at best) in the technical history books because they are such an inspiration to the rest. I'm thankful for The Anita Borg Institute and other organizations for bringing awareness to the HERstory of women in technology.

[dynasaw]

2. Women were the pioneers of technology

It is still a little known fact that the foundations of modern computer technology were
essentially established by women. From Ada, the countess of Lovelace, Grace Hopper and
the women of ENIAC, we wouldn't be where we are today without their
still largely unrecognized pioneering work.


I teach a college course on gender and technology and am still surprised that students still
manage to get through high school without ever having heard of these pioneers, so yes, thank you
Triana for this posting.

http://www.1st-art-gallery.com/thumbnail/131623/1/Augusta-Ada-King,-Countess-Of-Lovelace-$281815-52$29,-$282$29,-1852.jpg

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=&imgrefurl=http://ahamshay.com/tech/the-women-of-eniac&usg=__6j5MRz1OrfyB_uXlP0h73TXRw_Y=&h=377&w=580&sz=125&hl=en&start=7&tbnid=ndJfeD75hkh7GM:&tbnh=87&tbnw=134&prev=/images%3Fq%3DENIAC%2BWOmen%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den

[Triana]

3. Those ENIAC women were incredible! But...

...it was the men who built the hardware that got all the recognition - until - what - 60 YEARS later? Oi....

Without those woman mathematicians to PROGRAM that hardware - it was useless!

[Xipe Totec]

11. TRUTH VALUES: ONE GIRL'S ROMP THROUGH M.I.T'S MALE MATH MAZE Comes to Cambridge's Central Square

Are women inherently inferior to men in math and science, as Lawrence Summers, then President of Harvard, suggested several years ago? Writer/performer and recovering mathematician, Gioia De Cari offers a woman's perspective on this question in TRUTH VALUES: ONE GIRL'S ROMP THROUGH M.I.T.'S MALE MATH MAZE, an autobiographical solo show coming to Cambridge's Central Square Theater in a limited engagement this fall. Presented by Underground Railway Theater and directed by Miriam Eusebio, TRUTH VALUES plays Thursday, September 10 through Sunday, September 20; press night is set for Friday, September 11 at 8 PM. Selected performances will be followed by conversations with artists and scientists from MIT and Harvard.

In TRUTH VALUES: ONE GIRL'S ROMP THROUGH M.I.T.'S MALE MATH MAZE, Gioia De Cari shares her experiences in the exotic boys club of higher mathematics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. While making the most of the comic absurdity of being pawed by nerds, being asked to serve cookies at a seminar, and retaliating with fashion experiments, TRUTH VALUES is also a serious exploration of the world of elite mathematics and the role of women in science.



http://broadwayworld.com/article/TRUTH_VALUES_ONE_GIRLS_ROMP_THROUGH_MITS_MALE_MATH_MAZE_Comes_to_Cambridges_Central_Square_Theater_910_20090831

[lapfog_1]

9. The original computer "debuggers"

They would not only operate the machine but debug it by finding the moths that would find their way into the machine and die from either the heat or by being zapped. Removing the moths so that the computer would work was a near nightly task.

[Triana]

10. Photo of first "computer bug" . . .

[Burma Jones]

4. I've taken my 9 year old Daughter to Grace Hopper's grave in Arlington

My 9 yo is also at the top of her class in Mathematics

I make it abundantly clear that she is expected to be every bit as technically proficient as her older brother....and perhaps me, I have a PhD in Computing.

Currently, she's REALLY into insects and spiders and singing..........and soccer......and Beatles Rock Band


My Doctoral program in Computing was about 40% female.


I have a three year old daughter too........we'll see how well she embraces Math and Science

[Triana]

7. GOOD! This is great!

It gives me hope. The environment I came up in was not nearly as positive or open for women in technology.

KUDOS to you for helping your girl geeks succeed!

[Poll_Blind]

5. As a liberal male computer geek that was both inspiring, more than a little touching...

...(given the gender barriers that still exist in our so-called advanced American society) and also sexy hotness on a silver platter.

I know that just about every one of those women did not have as easy a time as I did entering and staying in the field, simply because technical fields are dominated by males and enough males exist with sexist viewpoints (as occurs in any field, sadly) as to make the journey of any and every woman out of the stereotypical archaic gender roles, a struggle.

My mother, who was in the physics field, used to tell me the things she had to endure in the 50's and 60's just to attend class because she was female. So I get a little choked up knowing these women are the second or third generation after that, still pushing the envelope for equality, and also still fighting some of the same battles- just to be allowed to do what they desire.

And nothing's sexier than an a self-actualized human. :)

K&R with a flourish!

PB

[Triana]

8. THANK YOU Poll_Blind...I could write a book myself about my struggles in the field

past - and yes - present. It has been a struggle to get in - and to remain in the field.

And you know, this is a loss to THE WORLD - because many women have SO much to offer in the way of technical innovation, and ideas (as much as men) - and we're cheating ourselves by marginalizing them or shutting them out due to sexism. It really is a shame.

THANK YOU for your support!