Channels, Fall 2016

Channels • 2016 • Volume 1 • Number 1 Page 73 when they made a stand to ride bicycles instead of the “more modest” tricycles, despite men’s attempts to keep women from using bicycles. Some of these women bicyclists even created documentation detailing how and when to ride a bicycle. This essentially put them in the role of technical communicators. They pushed against social norms to create their own. Another example relates to microwaves. Microwaves were first marketed to bachelors; later on, after women re-gendered the microwave to be a product commonly used in kitchens, they were marketed more to women. Manufacturers switched from selling microwaves in the masculine electronics section to selling them in the home and kitchen section of stores. However, technical communicators cannot simply ignore societal norms in an attempt to produce completely neutral documents (Durack 1998; Cunningham 2015). In the case of 19 th -century sewing machine manuals, technical writers did not follow the societal norms that associated women and sewing (Durack 1998). While no one argued that it was mainly women who sewed, no one believed that women should or could attempt sewing once it became possible with a machine, or technology. Therefore, writers created sewing machine manuals that catered to men. They did not adhere to societal norms, and they failed to create user-centered documents. Cunningham (2015) would agree that user-centered design is of utmost importance, and that gender plays a large role in successful design. “Add Women and Stir” Fallacy Both Jackson (2007) and Sullivan (2011) warn technical communicators of the “Add Women and Stir” fallacy. This fallacy involves simply adding women to a certain field in order to lessen any gender disparities. While this idea may seem effective in theory, in practice it does not have the long-term effects that really eliminate gender disparities or increase diversity in workplaces. Sullivan (2011) points out that adding women to a field does not automatically enhance their experience in the workplace. In fact, adding women to a field just because they are women could actually make workplace conditions worse for them because men could assume that women were hired because of their gender, not their skills or expertise. Similarly, Jackson (2007) further explains that this fallacy does not address the real issues behind gender disparity in work places. Companies and employers must understand gender better so they can know what females (and males) hope to gain from workplace scenarios. Furthermore, attempting to fix this gender gap by adding women to male- dominant fields implies that women’s success must be measured the same way as men’s (Noddings 2001). Integrating Feminism into Undergraduate Studies Students should learn about the different approaches to feminism, mainly postmodern, liberal, and radical, in their undergraduate studies of technical communication. As mentioned earlier, these three types of feminism are very different, and they have all played a part in shaping the relationship between women and technical communication. Despite the impact or lack of impact that some of these approaches might currently have on