Anything related to Gender and Technology Research Paper

Anything related to Gender and Technology - Research Paper Example Various people link technology with computer devices, robots and other advances in science, limiting themselves in defining technology in small terms. Experts agree that technology review as larger than chips and optics will allow people uncover how technological patterns perpetuate social and cultural class stratification. This paper will investigate how the notion of gender shapes technology and investigate different ways in which technology (cosmetic surgery) has influenced lives of women. Discussion The discussion will investigate diverse ways in which bodies of women are structured and deconstructed in modern culture and some moral, social and political outcomes such processes for the women’s well-being, (Negrin, 2008). It will also focus on gender technology (cosmetic surgery), for instance those forms of socio-cultural practices the make the human body gendered. Similarly, the theoretical foundation of this paper is that the aspect of the human body as highly hypothesiz ed and expressed with certain cultural contexts including economic, social, religious and influential political discourses is crucial. Such discourses represent the extensive system of belief or cultural ideologies, and as they function in performances, they establish verbal and non-verbal rules and laws for how both men and women are expected to feel, perceive and act in relation to the environment and other people. Body modification (cosmetic surgery) as a masculinity or femininity identity mark has extensive and ancient cultural origin. A number of ancient practices (such as wearing of the corset and binding of foot), have increasingly been dumped, whereas others (like FMG, tattooing and male circumcision) are persistent, (Davis, 1995). Similarly, new ways of promoting ones manhood and womanhood through diverse aspects of the body are persistently being created. Contemporary medicine and fashion permit practical modification of gender bodies to attain idealized notion of masculin ity and femininity. The rate of cosmetic surgery in the modern globe to enhance desirability, attractiveness and appeal of a person to other sex is continually rising. These practices have increasing dominated the mainstream media and popular culture in an attempt to fix the norm of approved ideal feminine and masculine attractiveness and, therefore, reinforce the man-woman polarity. In feminist studies, woman body is perceived as part of scripting of cultural anxiety regarding life, regulation and death and actual human implication. In other words, female’s bodies are increasingly main features and thus, reflect the challenges, panic and the public disunity and socio-cultural aspects in the postmodern era, (Parker & Rhian, 2010). Various issues emerge as a fundamental source of controversy for instance, gender technologies such as cosmetic surgery and inequality experiences that draw a wider gap between male and female body. Cosmetic surgeries are aimed to amend physical abn ormalities or promote a normal physical character and, therefore, enhance appearance. Cosmetic surgery, as an extensively wide field, which may provide reconstructive surgery for people with devastating burns or physical damage, can be utilized aesthetic purposes such as smoothening wrinkles, breasts enlargement and reshaping noses. In the past, cosmetic surgery practices were mainly restricted to necessary surgery to ensure patient well-being and health. Such surgical practices

IBM and the Holocaust Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

IBM and the Holocaust - Essay Example IBM’s German subsidiary, called Dehomag, once put up a poster in German whose translation to English meant â€Å"see everything with Hollerith punch cards.† This poster, while at the time simply advertising the importance of punch cards in capturing individuals’ information, have been found to have been the reason why the Nazis found it easy to carry out mass murders of the minority groups in Germany. Dehomag is the acronym for the company Deutsche Hollerith Maschinen Gesellschaft (German Hollerith Machine Corporation); a company established in 1910 by Willy Heidinger. Heidinger later sold the company to American industrialist Charles Flint. Through various stages of acquisitions, Dehomag eventually became a direct subsidiary of CTR which was later renamed to International Business Machines in 1924 (Jeffery, 2001). The idea of punch cards had been conceived by Herman Hollerith about the year 1880. Hollerith was working for the US Census Bureau. The punch cards were basically readable cards with perforations in a standardized pattern. Every perforation represented a given piece of information about the individual such as their nationality, occupation, gender, and so on. The traits could be easily sorted out to give the desired picture of a given population. For example, gender could be used to divide the country into males and females (Hayes, 2000). Adolf Hitler and the chief executive officer of IBM Thomas J. Watson are two of the people most famously accused of the genocide in Nazi Germany. While Hitler broadcasted his hate messages against the Jews (and other races), he found fanatics among great men such as Henry Ford and Thomas Watson. With IBM’s presence in Germany and with Hitler at the helm, it was not by chance that Watson fueled Hitler’s aims. While, in my opinion, Watson and IBM are victims of circumstances, their role in the holocaust shall remain significant. If they had turned down Germany’s use of punch cards, they would not have prevented the holocaust since Germany would have obtained the technology anyway.