Actual dates

Submission of abstracts:
- September 1, 2008

Notification of acceptance:
- October 1, 2008

Call for Contributions

5th European Symposium on Gender & ICT
"Digital Cultures: Participation - Empowerment - Diversity"

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Information Society with its variety of new information and communication media offers many new options to participate in today's social, cultural, political and economic activities. However, chances are still distributed unequally, e.g. by class, ethnicity, age - and by gender. Access to and the ability to use information and communication technology (ICT) are necessary prerequisites for participation. On top of this, involvement in ICT design is a highly prestigious activity.

On the 5th European Gender and ICT Symposium we will take a closer look at the complex interdependence between gender and ICT. We will explore ways to increase appreciation of diversity in design and use and to strengthen empowerment and participation by means of ICT. This conference, the fifth in a row of symposia held in Europe since 2003, traditionally provides a meeting point for researchers from various disciplines and research schools dealing with gender and ICT. We invite you to share your experiences, in particular regarding the following topics:

• Gendering in Design
  

  What values are present in society and inscribed in technology and how can they be deconstructed? With what kinds of assumptions and values about technologies, users and society do designers work? Whose values and experiences are represented and what dichotomies and stereotypes are repeated in technologies and technological cultures?

• Computing Science - a Gendered Discipline?
  

  Where do we find women it ICT? What barriers do they encounter? In what way are their lives being supported (or not) by technology? How is gender inscribed in the concepts and culture of the discipline of computing? What structures further such inscriptions? What is needed for "un-doing gender" in computing science?

• Gender & Technology Curricula
  

  What should students learn about "gender and technology"? In what way is it possible to integrate such contents into curricula of technical disciplines?

• Competences in Technology/Digital Media and Social Participation
  

  How does school education integrate Digital Media? What does media competence mean? Where and how does gendering happen in girls' and boys' education? What best practices can guide the way towards an education that offers equal opportunities for social participation?

• Digital Cultures, Identity and Subject Construction
  

  What gender expectations are suggested? What hidden norms and values are inscribed in computer games and other software? How is identity constructed online? What possibilities do online-communities offer for the construction of the self?

• Gender, Work and ICT
  

  In what economic branches do we find so-called 'female work'? What kind of computer support can be found in these areas? How does software design affect work processes and how does it reflect job images? What measures are taken and what are the results?

• Design for Gender & Diversity
  

  How can gender be used as an eye-opener for diversity in design? What other groups' requirements are poorly represented in today's technology?

• Globalisation and Local Action
  

  What effects does the development of new ICTs have - on the global and on the local level? How do global changes affect the local and vice versa? How does ICT influence gender relations in developing countries?

Please submit extended abstracts of about 3 pages (max. 10.000 characters) describing projects and research results via the conference homepage: http://www.conftool.com/gict2009/
Every submission will be blind reviewed by three members of the program committee. Accepted abstracts will be published on the conference-website. Work in progress and late breaking results can be presented by means of posters. These have to be described on max. two pages (max. 6.000 characters).

Program chairs
Prof. Dr. Susanne Maass
Prof. Dr. Heidi Schelhowe

Conference organisation
Maike Hecht
Bettina Rabe
Carola Schirmer
Susanne Maass
Heidi Schelhowe

Please address any questions concerning the symposium to: gict@informatik.uni-bremen.de
Marlott Hederich
University of Bremen
Computer Science Department
Postbox 330 440
28334 Bremen
Germany
Phone: (49) 421 - 218 64390