Gender, Communication, and the Digital Revolution invites readers to study the changing notions of identity and diversity as they apply to gender and its intersection with the digital age. Through exposure to a carefully selected collection of readings and a variety of scholarly perspectives, students gain the knowledge and competence needed to successfully communicate in the broader arena of gender diversity. Organized in five sections, the book covers current deba

Computers, now the writer's tool of choice, are still blamed by skeptics for a variety of ills, from speeding writing up to the point of recklessness, to complicating or trivializing the writing process, to destroying the English language itself. A Better Pencil puts our complex, still-evolving hate-love relationship with computers and the internet into perspective, describing how the digital revolution influences our reading and writing practices, and how the latest technologies differ from what came before. The book explores our use of computers as writing tools in light of the history of communication technology, a history of how we love, fear, and actually use our writing technologies--not just computers, but also typewriters, pencils, and clay tablets. Dennis Baron shows that virtually all writing implements--and even writing itself--were greeted at first with anxiety and outrage: the printing press disrupted the "almost spiritual connection" between the writer and the page; the typewriter was "impersonal and noisy" and would "destroy the art of handwriting." Both pencils and computers were created for tasks that had nothing to do with writing. Pencils, crafted by woodworkers for marking up their boards, were quickly repurposed by writers and artists. The computer crunched numbers, not words, until writers saw it as the next writing machine. Baron also explores the new genres that the computer has launched: email, the instant message, the web page, the blog, social-networking pages like MySpace and Facebook, and communally-generated texts like Wikipedia and the Urban Dictionary, not to mention YouTube. Here then is a fascinating history of our tangled dealings with a wide range of writing instruments, from ancient papyrus to the modern laptop. With dozens of illustrations and many colorful anecdotes, the book will enthrall anyone interested in language, literacy, or writing.

The Palgrave Handbook of Gender, Media and Communication in the Middle East and North Africa stands as an authoritative and up-to-date resource on the critical debates, research methods and ongoing reflections on how gender and communication intersect with the economic, social, political, and cultural fabrics of the countries in the MENA region. The Handbook comprises thirty-one chapters written by both established and rising scholars of gender, media, and digital technologies, and will rely on fresh data which seeks to capture the dynamic and complex realities of MENA societies, as well as the tensions and contradictions in the politics of gender and uses of communication technologies. The Handbook is split into six sections: Gender, Identities and Sexualities; The Gender of Politics; Gender and Activism; Gender-Based Violence; Gender and Entrepreneurship; and Gender in Expressive Cultures.

The Gender Revolution and New Sexual Health: Celebrating Unlimited Diversity of the Human Sexuality Hypercube deconstructs the gender binary and introduces students to the mathematics of unlimited human sexual diversity.

In this work, Bridgette Wessels offers a unique insight into the ways in which core public institutions and powerful organizations develop digital communications and services within the public realm. The book draws on her ethnographic research with the London Metropolitan Police Service during their engagement in an innovative project to improve communication with the public using digital technology. As one of the largest, most advanced and highly respected police services in the world, working in a socially, culturally and demographically complex city, the Metropolitan Police Service offers a highly revealing case study of technology and the human processes which it is designed to serve. The ethnographic research is used to develop a new theoretical and conceptual framework for understanding the relationship between social action and technological change, addressing the way in which technology is socially shaped and culturally informed. The book also discusses the role of ethnography as a tool for researching complex multi-perspective, multi-sited networks of the innovation of digital technologies as forms of communication in late modern western society.

In this clear-eyed, candid, and ultimately reassuring

Gender in Communication: A Critical Introduction embraces the full range of diverse gender identities and expressions to explore how gender influences communication, as well as how communication shapes our concepts of gender for the individual and for society at large. Authors Catherine Helen Palczewski, Danielle D. McGeough, and Victoria Pruin DeFrancisco equip readers with the critical analysis tools to form their own conclusions about the ever changing processes of gender in communication. This comprehensive gender communication book is the first to extensively address the roles of religion, the gendered body, single-sex education, an institutional analysis of gender construction, social construction theory, and more. The Fourth Edition has streamlined the text to make it more accessible to students without sacrificing the sophistication of the book′s trademark intersectional approach.

World-renowned economist Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum, explains that we have an opportunity to shape the fourth industrial revolu­tion, which will fundamentally alter how we live and work. Schwab argues that this revolution is different in scale, scope and complexity from any that have come before. Characterized by a range of new technologies that are fusing the physical, digital and biological worlds, the developments are affecting all disciplines, economies, industries and governments, and even challenging ideas about what it means to be human. Artificial intelligence is already all around us, from supercomputers, drones and virtual assistants to 3D printing, DNA sequencing, smart thermostats, wear­able sensors and microchips smaller than a grain of sand. But this is just the beginning: nanomaterials 200 times stronger than steel and a million times thinner than a strand of hair and the first transplant of a 3D printed liver are already in development. Imagine “smart factories” in which global systems of manu­facturing are coordinated virtually, or implantable mobile phones made of biosynthetic materials. The fourth industrial revolution, says Schwab, is more significant, and its ramifications more profound, than in any prior period of human history. He outlines the key technologies driving this revolution and discusses the major impacts expected on government, business, civil society and individu­als. Schwab also offers bold ideas on how to harness these changes and shape a better future—one in which technology empowers people rather than replaces them; progress serves society rather than disrupts it; and in which innovators respect moral and ethical boundaries rather than cross them. We all have the opportunity to contribute to developing new frame­works that advance progress.

While the digital revolution is reaching rural areas in many developing countries, the rural digital divide continues to present considerable challenges. The problem is even more acute for women, who face a triple divide: digital, rural and gender. This publication looks at the benefits of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) when placed in the hands of men and women working in agriculture and in rural areas. It examines the challenges to be overcome and makes recommendations so that rural communities can take full and equal advantage of the technologies. FAO’s E-agriculture 10 Year Review Report on implementation of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) of the Action Line C7. ICT Applications: e-agriculture concludes that while substantial progress has been made in making ICTs available and accessible for rural communities, challenges remain with respect to the following seven critical factors for success: content, capacity development, gender and diversity, access and participation, partnerships, technologies, and finally, economic, social, and environmental sustainability. This publication analyses with the gender lens the seven factors of success, followed by an overview of the general existing barriers to women’s access to, control and use of ICTs. Finally, it offers a series of recommendations for better integration of gender in ICT initiatives, based on gender mainstreaming throughout the seven critical factors of success, illustrated with concrete examples