The Changing Nature of Disciplinary Genders – A Position Paper V. Lakshmi Narasimhan 1 and G.Vasistha Bhargavi 2 1 Srikar and Associates, USA, Australia & India and 2 Chaoyang University of Technology, Taichung, Taiwan. Email: srikar1008@gmail.com and vbvasishta@gmail.com Prologue: This paper is written after numerous focus- group meetings with several types of people/experts of many genders. Statements given under are not meant to be insulting any gender, but these are focus-group observations. If you do not like any such statements, we are sorry in that you have missed the points we are trying to convey. Abstract–This paper addresses various perceptions on genders that concerns abstract entities such as various disciplines of studies. This paper defines genders for disciplines through historical biases and perceptions – e.g., birth, religion, language, region, brought up , to say a few; these were obtained thru’ several focus-group discussions. However, technologies, such as computers, the World Wide Web (WWW), Moodle, sensor networks, Internet of Things (IoT), Virtualization and Immersion technologies are constantly changing the nature of education and learning. As a consequence, and through a series of arguments, we establish that the genders of many popular disciplines are becoming feminine in nature. We also define two terms, namely, Gender Capital and Gender Capitalization, through which respectively one could possibly define and analyze ways and means by which the changing nature of genders of disciplines can be profitably exploited for the global goodness. Keywords–Information and Other Technology Impacts, Changing nature of Education, Raising Feminity in Education & Learning, Disciplinary Genders, Gender Capital and Gender Capitalization. 1. INTRODUCTION People commonly associate genders to animate and inanimate objects, but rarely to abstract objects such as, disciplines of studies as in Electrical Engineering, Civil Engineering, Surgery and Nursing. However, because of historical biases or due to lack of knowledge (sometimes?), one feels that some disciplines are predominantly considered as masculine (or feminine 1 ). For a long time, Civil Engineering and Mechanical Engineering were considered masculine fields, i.e., wherein only males get into. We articulate a set of rationale for these beliefs. However, technology is changing the manner in which people are leaning and gaining skills and knowledge. For instance, computers, software systems, the World Wide Web (WWW) and Moodle are changing the nature of learning – from hardcore ‘place and time fixed manner’ to anywhere any time learning. In addition, websites such as YouTube, are teaching a variety of skills through educational videos – e.g., one can learn how to sew a 1 We differentiate between word sets male & female and masculine & feminine. woolen sweater or how to change oil in a car – through such skill-imparting videos. Indeed the author acknowledges gaining several such skills from YouTube alone! Other websites offer even higher order skills such as Yoga, Breathing techniques, Meditation, etc. As a consequence of the changing nature of education and learning, the genders of various disciplines are also moving forward to becoming more feminine than in the past – could it be? Can this move to taking a new gender be used to the advantage of the global goodness? This paper deals with these issues. The rest of the paper is organized as follows: section 2 provides the basis for determining the genders of various disciplines, while section 3 describes the changing nature of education – mainly due to the computer and software related technologies. Section 4 provides sound arguments on the changing nature of genders of commonly known disciplines, followed by discussions on this issue in section 5. The conclusion summarizes the paper and provides several pointers for further research work in this arena. 2. HOW TO DETERMINE GENDERS OF DISCIPLINES The term gender is used to imply a wider set of attributes than just describing male and females. For instance, it is well-recognized in the literature that organizations and processes also exhibit genders, gender preferences and gender biases [1-4]. The process of identifying and working with organizational gender issues is known as ‘genderization of organization’ [5] or simply genders in organization. For instance, a hospital exhibits typical characteristics of feminine gender, while the military is typically masculine, even though people of both sexes may be working in these organizations. Some organizational processes also show gender-related influences – for example, the nursing profession and processes therein have been predominantly feminine gender oriented, wherein they follow rules with local interpretations, while generic military processes and procedures follow male-oriented or simply masculine procedures of rigid adherence to definitive rules and procedures with little variations therein at all. Even abstract entities such as Disciplines exhibit genders and this may be due to extended perceptions and long-held biases [6, 7, 8]. For example, the fields of Civil & Mechanical Engineering, Surgery, Mechanics in various fields (e.g., Plumbing, Carpentry, and Automobile Mechanics) are essentially considered male-professions. On the other hand, Nursing and various Therapists (e.g., Occupational Therapy, Speech Therapy, etc) are considered feminine-professions. Military and Management have long been the bastions of males, 978-1-7281-5286-8/19/$31.00 ©2019 IEEE 41 2019 11th International Conference on Advanced Computing (ICoAC) 978-1-7281-5286-8/20/$31.00 ©2020 IEEE 10.1109/ICoAC48765.2019.247123 Authorized licensed use limited to: Chaoyang University of Technology. Downloaded on May 31,2020 at 05:40:16 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.