Writers and Gender

[fable]

Jormund, you're not being picked on. It's common in SYM for people to be questioned about anything they claim. There's no hostility involved, just an attempt to hold all of us to the same level of intellectual engagement. We back up our statements that we claim are facts rather than opinions, and we (often) provide links or offline sources. So when you state that you're "bringing psychology into play," thus indicating that you're not giving an opinion but offering something more factual, and continue with a statement out of pop-psychology self-help books, you can expect to be challenged. After all, you're the one who started by "invoking a higher standard." As you made the allegations, it's up to you to provide credentials, first, not C Elegans.

But if you want to know, CE is a neuro-biologist by profession. What's your background?

And no, I can't remember where or when I read or heard this, but I think one of my teachers mentioned this, more than once actually.

So you're not sure where you heard it, or whether it was taught to you, or whether the people who taught it to you had any credentials in the field of brain research (which, I'll think you'll agree, is unlikely). This doesn't sound promising.

[Fiberfar]

What if I told you he was a student that watched far too much Discovery Channel for his own good.

And since he don't seem to remember, mabye you or CE could if you got the time try to look into it if you want to know for sure.

[fable]

Fiberfar, play nice.

As for the subject of left-brain/right-brain, we already hit it a couple of years back, I think. I distinctly remember CE taking it to pieces at the time.

[Fiberfar]

[QUOTE=fable]Fiberfar, play nice. That's close to a flame.
[/QUOTE]

What part of my post is? I know Jormund in person, so he knows what I mean.

[Jormund]

Okay, I've seen other SYM'ers been nearly roasted because of a simple sentences mispelled (as for that part, I think that this forum has gone beyond its title, it should have a new one 'Ethic, Religious and Wordly Matters Discussed to the Death.) and I don't have a background for this, so I do not know for certain that all this is completely true. I am merely suggesting a reason. But if C Elegans really is a neuro-biologist with education, then she should not bombard me with questions, but rather tell me\us what IS true, and what is not, therein teaching me\us.

EDIT: Fiber, I've never seen any shows on Discovery on this matter. But that about them checking it out was a good idea, and if they already have, I would like to see the info they came up with. Fable?

[fable]

There's no way to judge your friendship or otherwise with a person from a short post. But when refers third-hand to a person in their presence as "a student that watched far too much Discovery Channel for his own good," that sounds like dissing them.

If you do know him, though, that's a different matter.

It also doesn't reflect well on the Discovery Channel.

[fable]

[QUOTE=Jormund]Okay, I've seen other SYM'ers been nearly roasted because of a simple sentences mispelled...[/quote]

I've seen one serious criticism of misspelling in six years here, and about five jokes about it. That's it. In any case, that doesn't have anything to do with reading the forum's serious threads, and getting a sense of how people question and respond in 'em.

I am merely suggesting a reason. But if C Elegans really is a neuro-biologist with education, then she should not bombard me with questions, but rather tell me\us what IS true, and what is not, therein teaching me\us.

She bombarded you with questions because you set yourself up by using the sentence, "About the author issue, I would like to bring some psychology into play." In other words: "I have some special knowledge I'd like to offer, which differs in its serious tone and content from the rest of this thread." And the factoid was wrong. I know CE takes knowledge seriously, as do we all. Feel free to contribute, but as I wrote before--expect to be challenged. And feel free to challenge others who make factual statements, rather than ask questions or utter opinions.

[dragon wench]

Moving back towards topic.....


I have discovered something interesting with the Genie. When I paste in public posts or samples of academic writing it overwhelmingly thinks I am male. With any fiction or poetry I have written there is a relatively even split. When I enter PMs or emails, the Genie perceives I am female.

Why would (in my case anyway), more private, personal writing be perceived as female? Does it reflect greater vulnerability? Or, do I subconsciously employ less assertative, less informational writing in private, informal correspondance?

[Jormund]

Wise words that, and I'll make certain nobody think I know more than them in the future about something that I maybe don't. Maybe SYM shoud be removed altogether. But I seriously want to see the info you have on the topic.

Edit: To Fable.

[fable]

Jormund, I think your pal Fiberfar was kidding you when he mentioned the Discovery Channel, which he seemed to imply. If you want to continue arguing the matter, I would suggest you take it to PMs (private messages) with Fiberfar and/or C Elegans.

DW, it certainly sounds like those gender biases again about assertiveness and informational content in writing. I entered a bit of a book by one of my favorite modern authors, Frances Yates, part of the Warburg school of cultural history. Her work is viewed by these algorithms as extreme male.

[C Elegans]

@Jormund: Please don't take my questions as an attack. There are just questions, and the reason why I start with those questions rather than explaning what is known scientifically about this topic, is that I actually (you may not agree) think it is more polite and better for the discussion to first examine what your sources of informations are before I start telling you "No, no you are wrong, I am right". Like Fable posted, you stated that you were to "bring some psychology into play" and that "science has proved..." something, and these statements are strong. To say that "science has proved" something means it is a fact, which in turn means you must know what science says, to make the statement.

Thus, for what I know, you could simply be the most misguided colleague I've ever met

Take it easy, I'm no expert on this. And no, I can't remember where or when I read or heard this, but I think one of my teachers mentioned this, more than once actually. As for the left\right brain usage, of course its best to use both at the same task, but there is proven through nerve sensors that the left is being used more than the right when f.ex. painting. Vice versa when f.ex. creating a chart or diagram.

If your teachers are teaching you this, please tell them they are misinformed and ask them to read the textbooks below and to check out the scientific literature in this field.

Where is it provem that nerve sensors (do you mean receptors?) in the left hemisphere are used more when painting than when reading a chart? And if this has been demonstrated, how do we know that says anything of whether the left hemisphere is more "creative"? If it is correct (which I believe when I see a some replicated studies of it, not before that), it could be that some of the left hemisphere is more active because most people paint with their right hand and the hand motor functions are crossed so use of the right hand is connected to the motor cortex is the left hemisphere.

And one thing, who are you to question everything I say? Do you actually know something about this topic? Or are you wildly attacking without knowing why?

I did not mean to "attack" you, just to seriously question your statements since I find they are totally incorrect, but you present them as if they are facts. I know something of this topic, yes. Short CV: I am a neuroscientist and a lic. neuropsychologist who work with human brain research and teach postgrauduate medical and psychology students. If you read the literature in neuroscience and neuropsychology, you will find that current scientific findings go against the idea of gender related hemispheric specialisation.

There is a really nice textbook called "Cognitive Neuroscience", edited by Gazzaniga, a very well known neuroscientist. This book is the golden standard for university level courses in cognitive neuroscience, ie the discipline that investigates how our thinking, perception and problem solving skills are related to our brain functioning. Another great textbook which is the golden standard for general neuroscience is Kandel & Schwartz "Principles of neural science". If you don't want to read them yourself, you should certainly ask your teachers to read them!

I distinctly remember having gone over the topic of cerebral lateralisation before on this board, I'll see if I can find the thread for you.

[Dottie]

[QUOTE=C Elegans]I distinctly remember having gone over the topic of cerebral lateralisation before on this board, I'll see if I can find the thread for you.[/QUOTE]

Its the thread about the male domination of RPGs I think: http://www.gamebanshee.com/forums/showt ... p?p=537900

[C Elegans]

[QUOTE=dragon wench]Why would (in my case anyway), more private, personal writing be perceived as female? Does it reflect greater vulnerability? Or, do I subconsciously employ less assertative, less informational writing in private, informal correspondance?[/QUOTE]

I don't know how the Genie works, but I noted on my own texts that for the fiction text it rated as female, the list of the most common words the Genie used for the analysis was "she" followed by "him". My speculation is that more women than men write fiction with a female "main person", so a story about a women would produce many sentences like "She was looking at him", whereas if you use a male "main person" it would be more "He was walking beside her".

[fable]

Rather ignores the changes in modern fiction over the last couple of decades, doesn't it? Back in the 1960s, there was great surprise and speculation when Alexei Panshein did a Heinlein-style novel with a heroine in first person. (Heinlein, a sexist pig, never forgave Panshein, and refused to speak with him after that.) And the comments of some James Joyce first-person feminine characters in some of his later novels scandalized a section of the Euro-American readership. But nowadays, I would say it's far more common to find men creating female narrators, and women, male narrators. It's not a good parameter to determine an author's sex through fiction--if indeed there are any, and I'm inclined to think there aren't.

[dragon wench]

[QUOTE=C Elegans]I don't know how the Genie works, but I noted on my own texts that for the fiction text it rated as female, the list of the most common words the Genie used for the analysis was "she" followed by "him". My speculation is that more women than men write fiction with a female "main person", so a story about a women would produce many sentences like "She was looking at him", whereas if you use a male "main person" it would be more "He was walking beside her".[/QUOTE]

Hmm... that makes a lot of sense for the fiction I entered. Though, I had similar results with my poetry which is written exclusively in the first person, as is also the case with the PMs/emails I entered.
lol! Fascinating stuff!
I also think Fable is right with regard to the Genie's inbuilt gender biases. Out of curiosity I entered a male friend's correspondance to me, and I specifically selected samples that involved a lot of thought/feeling. Not too surprisingly, the Genie categorised my friend as female.

There are some really interesting posts in this thread (thanks all ), and after I attend to a few things I want to come back to them.

[HighLordDave]

I'm not familiary with the genie, but I'd be interested to see what creteria it uses in its algorithms and what the characteristics it uses to identify something as "male" or "female".

I think whether you like male authors or female authors is more a function of genre than anything else. For instance, science fiction and fantays authors are predominantly male. That's not to say that women don't write good science fiction/fantasy, but that if you like science fiction/fantasy, chances are good that you're going to find that you like more male writers than female writers.

[fable]

[QUOTE=HighLordDave]I think whether you like male authors or female authors is more a function of genre than anything else. For instance, science fiction and fantays authors are predominantly male. That's not to say that women don't write good science fiction/fantasy, but that if you like science fiction/fantasy, chances are good that you're going to find that you like more male writers than female writers.[/QUOTE]

I think that's been changing over the last 30 years, HLD. People like Bradley, Cheryh, Vinge, LeGuin and a wide variety of well-known figures augur well for female writers in the sf&f genre. Mind, I don't think any more of their work than I do of their male counterparts for exactly the same reasons, but there's no getting around that they're extremely popular, and many have avoided the AD&D trap. Significantly, though, few of these writers actually deal with so-called "hard" science fiction, preferring the more speculative variety. I've been given to understand that's because the "hard" writers came out of science-oriented academic backgrounds where few women, you should excuse the expression, penetrated for years. People like Frank Herbert were very anxious to provide accurate background material for every detail of their larger fictional efforts, as a result. (I once heard Herbert give a live lecture chortling over the way he carefully measured and applied geological instruments to formulating new planets for his fiction, and couldn't help wondering, "Who the hell cared?") If women in scientific professions were to write sf&f today, I suspect some of them might take pride in doing as Herbert did. And presumably give boring lectures about it, too.

[HighLordDave]

You see that in many academic fields as well.

For instance, until about 40 years ago, most history was written by men. So if you liked to read history, you read male authors. However, now there are many good female historians who are in every way the equals of their male counterparts. Still, there is still some gender segregation within the discipline. For instance, you don't find many women who write military history.

It seems to me that people write the same kinds of things they like to read. I know several women who like to read "male" genres and male authors, so I wonder why there aren't more women writing the same sorts of books.

[VonDondu]

[QUOTE=C Elegans]There is a really nice textbook called "Cognitive Neuroscience", edited by Gazzaniga, a very well known neuroscientist. This book is the golden standard for university level courses in cognitive neuroscience, ie the discipline that investigates how our thinking, perception and problem solving skills are related to our brain functioning. Another great textbook which is the golden standard for general neuroscience is Kandel & Schwartz "Principles of neural science". If you don't want to read them yourself, you should certainly ask your teachers to read them![/QUOTE]
I demand that you tell us whether the authors of those really nice textbooks are male or female. You wouldn't be biased in favor of them because they were written by men or by women, would you?

[jopperm2]

@CE, I've read Austen and think she's really boring too, but I haven't read the others. I'm from the US though and we don't read. I had one US lit class and one British lit class and that's it.

I tend to think there are actions that could be classified as masculine and feminine and both genders do both types. Perhaps the genie classifies things like this but I don't think that's bad if you look at its results as you write in a masculine manner as opposed to you are a man. It's basically just assigning gender roles. I personally have mistaken two men on this forum for women though I won't reveal who publicly. Don't want to offend them.