The term geek has no gender specific connotations. Gender also has zero impact on the ways in which women interact with geek culture. However, geek culture talks to women differently because it believes that we are different. This interesting and somewhat quirky topic came to us from A90SKID in their article, “Semantics and Gender in Geek Culture.”
The Entertainment Software Association reports that 22% of game developers are female, which is significantly higher than in other areas of the technology sector. Interestingly enough, they also report that approximately 41% of self-identifying gamers are female.
Accounting for this data, when it comes to classifying geeks, what characteristics should be included? One thing to remember is, when talking about girls in geek culture, we need to avoid defining them by their gender. I know this makes the taxonomists‘ head spin a little, but a gamer is a gamer, a geek is a geek – regardless of gender.
Melody K. Smith
Sponsored by Access Innovations, the world leader in thesaurus, ontology, and taxonomy creation and metadata application.
