Cyberfeminist Reading: Gregg; Posting With Passion

Gregg, M.C., Posting With Passion: Blogs and the Politics of Gender, Uses of Blogs. Excerpt from Uses of Blogs.

I really like this article, it is one of the few I have found that really engages with the differences between men and womens blogging experiences rather than just assuming that the cybersphere is a gender free utopia. The article also contains many good references and links to interesting blogs.

Despite statistics showing that bloggers are fairly even in gender terms it is the perception that the more important and influential bloggers are men. Gregg examines factors that may contribute to this perception.

I think it is important to this article that Gregg refers to this phenomena as a ‘perception’ rather than a fact, for me this came across quite strongly in the line:
“…men’s blogs are often seen to be more engaged in political debate, especially when the notion of what counts as political remains undefined.” It is the perception of what is political and what is important that is, in a large part, against women bloggers. Gregg points out that women as a group spend more time in the domestic sphere so naturally write about it more than male bloggers. Although it may be true that women are concerned with the domestic, Gregg questions the idea of unimportance attached to this sphere, suggesting “an uncritical celebration of so-called feminine practices will only perpetuate the assumption that men are active agents leaving the home to work while women merely tend to the home’s reproduction, as if this were not also an exercise in labour”.

Gregg goes on to discuss technology use and gender noting “the adage ‘Blogs are for boys, journals are for girls’ summarized early observations that online diaries such as LiveJournal (LJ) served as natural extensions of the highly personal and intimate practice of teenage girls keeping a diary”. This is something I have noticed too, but previously not been able to put my finger on the difference, it seems that there is a general feeling of ‘blogs are for business and journals are for socialising’. This feeling is a large part of why we have deliberately chosen to distribute No Una Banana through blogger rather than live journal, despite live journal’s functionality and the familiarity many of the BananaGrrls have with the LJ interface.

Gregg finishes the article with an interesting discussion of her own blogging experience (which sadly linked to a 404) and women’s participation in blogs through commenting.


Reference:
Gregg, M.C., Posting With Passion: Blogs and the Politics of Gender, Uses of Blogs, in Uses of Blogs, A.a.J. Bruns, Joanne, Editor. 2006, Peter Lang. p. 151-160.