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7 Presentation of
8 "A Case for Feminism in Programming Language Design"
9 Felienne Hermans and Ari Schlesinger
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16 › Self presentation
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18 Arthur Pons
19 Computer engineer by trade
20 Worked as a research engineer at the Université de Strasbourg
21 Interested in the relationship between IT and environnemental issues
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23 PhD thesis with Commown, LIP and CITI
24 "Traduction du sujet"
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26
27 › Why read a paper about feminism in a computer science context
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29 1. Gain awareness about our biases, mainly in what type of knowledge we
30 produce and how we produce it
31 2. Use feminist theory, notable the concept of care, to help foster a
32 resilient, sustainable and empowering IT infrastructure for everyone
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34 This paper focuses on point number 1
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36 › Disclaimer
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38 I don't do research in programmling langage design
39 I don't do research in feminism
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41 › The authors
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43 Felienne Hermans is a scientist at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
44 PhD in software engineering
45 Her interests are :
46 programming education
47 spreadsheets
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49 Ari Schelsinger is a scientist at Georgia University
50 PhD in Human-Centered Computing
51 Her interests are :
52 understanding how social issues are encoded into technical objects and
53 infrastructure
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55
56 › The main questions
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58 Directly for the abstract
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60 1) What does it mean to design a programming language?
61 2) Why does minimal demographic diversity persist in the programming
62 language community?
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64 › Feminism as a critical thinking tool
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66 "I understand thinking of feminism is confusing for PL people, trust me, it did
67 not come naturally to me either! I thought feminism was just about gender. How
68 can gender, of all things, play a role in programming language design?"
69 › Feminism as a critical thinking tool
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71 "I understand thinking of feminism is confusing for PL people, trust me, it did
72 not come naturally to me either! I thought feminism was just about gender. How
73 can gender, of all things, play a role in programming language design?"
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75 The authors rely on modern feminist epistemology, more specifically on a
76 framework built for a glaciology paper :
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78 Carey, Mark, M. Jackson, Alessandro Antonello, and Jaclyn Rushing.
79 “Glaciers, Gender, and Science: A Feminist Glaciology Framework for Global
80 Environmental Change Research.” Progress in Human Geography 40, no. 6
81 (December 1, 2016): 770–93. https://doi.org/10.1177/0309132515623368.
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83 › Feminism as a critical thinking tool
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85 Feminism Can Help Question Values and Priorities of Programming Languages
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87 Feminism Can To Better Us Understand Science
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89 A central principle in feminism [...] is that knowledge is shaped by the
90 context in which it is made
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92 Feminism Is About More Than Gender (inclusivité)
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94 Feminism takes into account how discrimination across many different social and cultural identities is interconnected
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96 Feminism Is For Everyone
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99 › The paper's thesis
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101 "Diversity in both the design of PL and the demographics of the community
102 are limited because of the dominant culture that prioritizes theory and
103 formalism over people and social impact."
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106 › The paper's thesis
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108 "Diversity in both the design of PL and the demographics of the community
109 are limited because of the dominant culture that prioritizes theory and
110 formalism over people and social impact."
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112 The goal here is not to argue the dominant culture is intrisequely bad or that
113 it produces bad research.
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115 "This essay will not answer, but raise questions about how we can make the
116 field inclusive of more types of research, and more types of people,
117 including all genders."
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119 › Structure
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121 1. PL domain is not very diverse
122 2. Gendered Science and Knowledge
123 3. Systems of Scientific Domination
124 4. Knowledge Production
125 5. Alternative Representations
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127 › Structure
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129 1. PL domain is not very diverse
130 2. Gendered Science and Knowledge
131 3. Systems of Scientific Domination
132 4. Knowledge Production
133 5. Alternative Representations
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135 The authors provide statistics and anecdotes backed up by feminist litterature
136 to argue for each of those points. I feel a strong will to convince their
137 peers this is a worthwile endeavour.
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139 › CS domain is not very diverse
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141 "Only 10% of CS papers are authored by women"
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143 Girls are less likely to enter out-of-school programming clubs
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145 "Girls feel that the cannot enter the world of computers without endangering
146 their sens of feminity" (which the rest of society pushes on them)
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148 In maths "research has sound teachers view girls as successful [...] thanks to
149 their hard work, while they believe boy's success comes from their talent."
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151 › PL domain is not trouver autre formule
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153 PL domain historically was, and still is, largely western
154 => by default only 0..9 numerals
155 ١+١ won't work
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157 Most people are not visually impaired
158 => "system.cout>> reads "system <pause> c out greater than greater than" in
159 screen readers"
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161 › Gendered Science and Knowledge
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163 PL was made silmutaneously mathematical and masculine
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165 * At first an unsually feminine line of work
166 * With more complex architectures and automation came formalisation and
167 prestige*
168 * Now considered a domain that " requires vast mental powers, a kind of genius
169 with formalism akin to that of the mathematician"
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171 *Very well documented via the "Humble Programmer" speech of Dijkstra
172 › Gendered Science and Knowledge
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174 Traditionnaly valued :
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176 * Complex maths*
177 * Research on language features
178 * Building tools
179 * Quantitative methods
180 * Research that is "difficult"
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182 Less valued :
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184 * Use of said tools
185 * Qualitative methods
186 * A will to broaden research topics
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188 * "a senior academic jokingly say that a paper was rejected because ‘it did
189 not have enough Greek letters for POPL’"
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191 › Gendered Science and Knowledge
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193 "We are robbing ourselves of a place for conversations on the different
194 perspectives on the ways people use with programming languages."
195 › Systems of Scientific Domination
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197 Structural domination through norms
198 * Guidelines for conferences usually don't explain
199 what constitutes a good qualitative work
200 * Without the right tools reviewers are incentivize to place these kind of
201 works out of scope
202 * Change in norms have to come through the community but people who are
203 influential enough to do it are usually there because they upheld those
204 norms themselves
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206 Interpersonal domination
207 People with less mainstream research topics, methodologies or a non
208 majority identity (e.g being a black women) spend (conference) time :
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210 * answering entry level questions
211 * doing "diversity work"
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213 instead of seizing opportunities to learn and build connections about their
214 scientific interests
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216 › Knowledge production
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218 History of PL mainly retains man (although less in recent history)
219 builders
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221 This lens omits the perspectives of maintainers, teachers, advocates or critics.
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223 › Knowledge production
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225 Our biases go as deep as informing what even counts as a PL
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227 "A recent paper that investigated how to best teach programming to people
228 in the prison system describes a struggle to install the right software to
229 do so. When at their conference presentation they were asked why they did
230 not consider Excel (which in addition to formulas includes a VBA
231 interpreter), which was available, the audience burst out in laughter."
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233 › Alternative representations
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235 Alternative methodologies :
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237 * SocioPLT - What factors lead to programming language being adopted
238 * Controlled Experiments - What impact error messages have on the use of PL
239 * User-centered Design - Involving users in the design process of PL en citer
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241 Alternative PL :
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243 firefox https://github.com/wordplaydev/wordplay/blob/main/LANGUAGE.md
244 yt c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77KAHPZUR8g
245 firefox https://wy-lang.org/
246 firefox https://www.hedy.org
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248 feh --fullscren -. crochet.jpg
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251 › Further reading and watching
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253 Ensmenger's paper on the genesis of masculine archetypes in IT (the hacker, the
254 corporate guy à la Bill Gates, the scientist etc), how they are related and how
255 they differ :
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257 Ensmenger, Nathan. “‘Beards, Sandals, and Other Signs of Rugged Individualism’:
258 Masculine Culture within the Computing Professions.” Osiris 30 (January 1,
259 2015): 38–65. https://doi.org/10.1086/682955.
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261 Isabelle Collet presentation "Femmes et numérique : pratiques égalitaires,
262 dispositifs inclusifs", in french and in a "Science communication" tone :
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264 https://jres.ubicast.tv/videos/femmes-et-numerique-pratiques-egalitaires-dispositifs-inclusifs_n26a9jqx6e/
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266 Slides sources :
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268 git : http://git.bebou.netlib.re/prez-lip/log.html
269 ssh : ssh guest@bebou.netlib.re -p 1459 prez-lip
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275 › Les slides
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277 git : http://git.bebou.netlib.re/prez-lip/log.html
278 ssh : ssh -t guest@bebou.netlib.re -p 1459 prez-lip