The (Girl) Geeks Shall Inherit The Earth

Okay, so according to dictionary.com the word ‘geek’ is defined as: ‘a computer expert or enthusiast (a term of pride as self-reference, but often considered offensive when used by outsiders)’ and have you ever noticed that university qualifications are all male orientated? A Bachelor of the Arts? A Masters? A Doctorate?

With all this testosterone flying about the working world, what opportunity is there for women? This is where the Girl Geeks phenomenon comes in.

Now, a Girl Geek is defined as: someone who is female and has an interest in technology, particularly innovation, computing and new media. Not necessarily technically-minded.

Official Girl Geek events have been going since 2005 in the UK. Set up by Sarah Blow in London, the idea of Girl Geeks is for likeminded women to meet up to discuss technology, science, innovation and business in an informal environment.

The dinners are coming to be recognised as a force slowly but surely helping to raise awareness as to why it’s important that more women enter the technology and science industries.

These events are set up all over the world, from the UK to Australia and all have huge bases of Geeks that turn up to the dinners. You would be forgiven if you thought that it was a women only thing, but men are welcome to come as guests to the female diners.

I think this idea is pretty close to being brilliant.

Girl Geeks is set up in order to diminish any kind of sexism within the industry. Lately, networking site Twitter has been used to help find more Girl Geeks.

Twitter has helped raise the profile of Girl Geeks and for them to get across their aims. If you look at the tweet opposite you’ll be able to see just what Girl Geeks is aiming to change “there are far too many girls” says more than I can ever wish to…

The main idea behind Girl Geeks is that women are embracing their gender; empowering themselves and moving away from the stereotypical life-role all in one fell swoop. With the introduction of these networking events, likeminded women are able to meet and discuss their careers in a friendly atmosphere. Another aspect of these nights is it’s inspirational speakers, who may just point any self-respecting Girl Geek in the right career trajectory.

There will, however, be those who see only the flip-side to this: is this too feminist that it actually becomes rather sexist? I’m all for women embracing their gender and empowering their sexualities through whatever means are possible, but one thing did enter my mind: is the concept of Girl Geeks actually not a little bit segregating in itself? Is Girl Geeks as avant-garde as the feminist or female community would like? Do Girl Geek groups do little more than explicitly mark out women in technology as anomolies?

These are definitely debates to be had.

Ultimately though, to me Girl Geeks offer valuable networking opportunities to women interested in science and innovative concepts that weren’t exactly as accessible before their conception. For that reason alone, Girl Geeks FTW!

The full original version of this feature appeared in Issue #35 of University of Sunderland’s Students’ Union magazine, Degrees North.

Photography by Hollie Galloway