Nerd Girls and Geek Brief TV
When I sent y’all over to IEEE.tv a few weeks ago to check out Nerd Girls, I wasn’t aware that they were getting Big Media attention. I should have known better. They’ve now made Newsweek, but I’ve got mixed feelings about the coverage. On the one hand, yay! Women engineers getting the attention they deserve! But on the other: “Meet the Nerd Girls: they’re smart, they’re techie and they’re hot.”
I don’t want to get into a rant. I will say that the word “coed” needs to be retired because it’s not 1972. (Apparently, this week I’ve got a list of words and phrases that need to be retired. More on that some other time, or perhaps place, like maybe Twitter.)
One of the things mentioned in the article, however, is the engineers’ penchant for watching Geek Brief TV. Hey! I’ve never heard of that! Guess I better check it out…
Gotta say, once you get used to how quickly Cali Lewis is talking, this is pretty damned cool. I’ve got about 350+ archived episodes to go through, so I don’t have the complete picture yet, but I’m comfortable recommending that you go check it out. I’m also checking out her other work on CaliLive.tv, so join me there as well.
What do you think? Leave a comment or drop me an email at ubergeeke@dotfiveone.com using the handy form on the Contact page.
Related posts:
- “Nerd Girls” on IEEE.TV
- Join The Nerd Girls
- Girls Gone Geek: TV For Your Ears
- Cali Lewis & GeekBrief.TV Hit 400
- “The Guild” Now Available On DVD
June 12th, 2008 at 7:25 am
Thanks for recommending the show!
Cali
June 13th, 2008 at 12:36 pm
The Newsweek article showed up on my MSN homepage (I hate that it pops when my IM loads but it is not enough of a bother to find the toggle to turn it off. The occasional celeb gossip item seems worth it).
I like that female geeks are getting the press and much of the article hits on important points, we can be who we want to be regardless of stereotypes.
My beef, however, is with the use of ‘girls’. I recognize that the group in the article, and others, self-describe as girls but why do we not fight for the description as women? I harken back to the fight for black men to not be called ‘boy’. They carried signs proclaiming “I am a man”. And the fight was all about respect.
‘Girls’ is a diminutive, it is less than full adult women. By adopting it I believe that we allow, if not promote, status as not deserving of respect. What ever happened to feminism in this day and age? Are we raising our daughters to net expect to be respected equally with men?
Anyone out there have an opinion about girl vs. woman?
I applaud this site being “Geekspace for Women”.
And so ends my rant. Don’t even get me started on the explosion of pink in recent years.
Nicki
June 16th, 2008 at 4:00 pm
I was around in ‘72 and please believe me, the word “coed” was offensive then too.
Nicki, I agree with you. The word girl should not be used for an adult woman. A human female CHILD a girl.
Oh and please DO start with the eplosion of pink . What is that all about? Are we back to thinking that blue is for boy children and pink is for girl children? A lot of us worked awfully hard to overcome that. I don’t like what I’ve been seeing in the stores lately.
I certainly support breast cancer research but does the National Breast Cancer Foundation HAVE to have a pink ribbon as their symbol and have all that pink on their website? It makes me very uncomfortable, let alone what men with breast cancer must think when they’re looking for help. They have a raft of stereotypes and embarrassment to overcome to even work up the nerve to ask for help so it doesn’t need to be made worse by all that pinkness.
I have always disliked pink as a color for women to wear because it is forced on females even before they are born. It’s hard for me to be objective about the color as a color because it’s been shoved in my face all of my life.
Too bad, too. But at least when I see it in nature as a flower color or part of a beautiful sunset I can apppreciate it.