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DIGITAL POSSIBILITIES: A Zoom of Our Own Conversation on Capitalism, Technology, and the Fight for a Feminist Internet

This event was recorded live. As some feminist epistemologists (Gilligan, Belenky et al.) have taught us, seeing and seeking connections seems to be women’s ways of knowing. Our economics is lived in real complex communities. Our goal is to model how women can talk together and learn together about traditionally male territory still new to most women. Together we can construct a fuller knowledge and set of values now omitted from the mainstream “free market.” To that end, we're making the webinar—and will make all of them moving forward—available here for viewing forevermore.

Click here to access the event curriculum for further learning.

The virtual world once felt like it could shape a different future—one more democratic and equitable. But capitalism—as well as its siblings, including racism and sexism—are turning digital spaces into the same corporatized, white- and male-dominated ones we’ve known for centuries. 

How have lopsided power structures shaped our digital experiences? What can virtual communities and digital movements reveal about the potential, still, for a reclamation of the democratic possibilities of technology? And what can we do now to build an intersectional, feminist future online? 

Find out by tuning in to this discussion with scholars and activists pushing back on digital power paradigms to find solutions.

ABOUT THE PANELISTS:

Breigha Adeyemo is a Communication and Science and Technology Studies scholar whose work centers at the intersections of technology, democracy, and racial/social justice. Her  overarching research goal is to democratize technology, in design and deployment, to produce more just, responsible, and inclusive technology. Breigha’s work has been published in Feminist Media Studies and covered or shared by NPR and PBS affiliates and the Associated Press.

Marie Tessier is a journalist and writer who moderates comments to the opinion pages of The New York Times. Her work has appeared on the Women's eNews and Women's Media Center websites, in Ms. Magazine, the Columbia Journalism Review, The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, and more. Her 2021 book, DIGITAL SUFFRAGISTS: WOMEN, THE WEB, AND THE FUTURE OF DEMOCRACY, explores why women's voices are outnumbered online and what we can do about it.

Riane Eisler is a social systems scientist, cultural historian, attorney, consultant, and speaker. Dr. Eisler is president of the Center for Partnership Studies and Editor-in-Chief of the Interdisciplinary Journal of Partnership Studies, and co-author of the book Nurturing Our Humanity: How Domination and Partnership Shape Our Brains, Lives, and Future. With CPS, she is now engaged in efforts to reshape AI under a partnership model and shake up the domination economies shaping digital innovation.

Carmen Rios, AEOO’s Digital Director—and a feminist superstar who has been writing about the intersections of race, gender, and class and holding space for feminists and queer folks online for over 10 years—moderated the conversation.

ABOUT THE SERIES:

Our economics is lived in real complex communities. Our goal is to model how women can talk together and learn together about traditionally male territory still new to most women.Our Zoom of Own Series brings women (and men!) together to construct a fuller knowledge and set of values now omitted from the mainstream “free market.” Together, we're flipping the script on a racist, sexist economy.