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I just want to point out how funny it was when I loaded the index page and saw this thread directly beneath "Foods you hate."

waitingroom wrote:What gives? Are you being jackasses because of the number under my username?

Yes.


It's because of your number and not because of your insipid questions.


I won't tell you why the women do the things they do.

They have asked me to keep it a secret.


shhhhhhhhhhh.






Faiz

Well, I think the part about guys being geekier and more likely able to tolerate the tedium of the job could be true. That said, these geeks probably aren't as good at writing songs or lyrics. Everybody's got their skillset.
However, there are always exceptions. Not every guy is a tech geek and not every girl is a poet/songstress. Just seems that way more often than not.
In my recording engineering college program the guy to girl ratio was roughly 10:1. In my graphic design program it was 1:10. Not because there's a patriarchy in music, but because in general girls will be more concerned with asthetic properties and guys with the mechanical side of things.
Again, this is just IN GENERAL. I'm not being sexist, these are just observations.

Oh yeah, and then you've got geeky guys who become girls like Walter/Wendy Carlos (of Clockwork Orange soundtrack fame)
Speaking of Wendy, check out her site. A lot of interesting stuff about recording and MIDI, as well as some neat ideas about alternative modes and scales that don't use the semi-tone as the divider.

nick92675 wrote:hey bob - hillary johnson is out in new york - you might be thinking of wendy schnieder.

Exactly right. Thanks for the correction. You'd think that with only ten women engineers on the planet, I could keep them straight . Hillary Johnson also is an accomplished web designer, as I just learned from her site.

sndo wrote:In my recording engineering college program the guy to girl ratio was roughly 10:1. In my graphic design program it was 1:10. Not because there's a patriarchy in music, but because in general girls will be more concerned with asthetic properties and guys with the mechanical side of things.
Again, this is just IN GENERAL. I'm not being sexist, these are just observations.

Yeah, I just question whether this is because of inherent (I'm guessing you think gender/genetics-based) motivations and skill sets, or whether this is just a natural fulfillment of societally expected gender roles. I mean, when most folks think about it, they think sound engineer = male and graphic designer = female, again as you said, IN GENERAL. Youre not the only one making this observation, so would anyone who is anticipating going into those programs or following those career paths. As I said above, most folks dont wanna be pioneers, they dont wanna fight an uphill battle. If the people who are your peers are gonna presume at the outset that "guys [will be] geekier and more likely able to tolerate the tedium of the job," then why would you want to head in against that? Just become a graphic designer, everyone knows girls can do that.

Ive helped a lot of women get started with recording and mixing live sound, all because they wanted to and asked me, so I know that women have an interest and can have as much of a talent for it as men, but where it all tends to fall apart is after I help them get started. They tend to have difficulty getting gigs, again, because a lot of clubowners, musicians, and other sound engineers dont expect that it's something that women can do. I know it isnt true, because Ive worked with quite a few really good mixers who were women, but it is rare, and that rarity just continues to reinforce the stereotype that women dont have the ability to do it, which means fewer pursue it, which leads to questions like the one that started this thread. Add in a healthy dose of rock n' roll sexism, and you got the whole deal.

Or at least that's my take on it.

I guess it's possible that in an industry overwhelmingly dominated by men that it would be harder for a girl to find a job.
Maybe I don't notice the gender inequality as much because I live in Canada (north of America). It seems to me that if you show your experience and knowledge on the subject then you get an equal opportunity.
But then again, even one of teachers was a bit sexist and homophobic. It's not that he would actually say something like "gay sex is bad" but he would always make dumb jokes in class that would often go over the line and a few students actually complained. If he wanted to have a beer with some students and tell jokes after class, he should've. Even a good number of guys in the class would complain that he was sexist. So he definitely showed some insensitivity. But he was the exception, not the rule. I think that the other teachers expected exactly the same out of everyone, regardless of sex. Again, it's probably a Canadian thing,
I bet sexism will faze out in the recording industry over time. It's just an industry with really slow turnover so you get a lot of old farts with their crappy beliefs of yore.

I can't speak to the recording industry, but my experience in computer science...

In school, I was usually the only woman in the room. Courses that had a slightly higher percentage of women were typically the required courses that everyone had to take, or they were the "soft" courses, like "human-computer interaction". (The percentage of female professors was similarly skewed.) Likewise, in the workplace, I rarely meet another female developer, though I do meet a lot of female techinical writers and graphic designers.

I would say that it is more of a societal phenomenon as opposed to an inherent gender-based, "men are hard-wired for technical work" thing. If you don't see lots of female parents/mentors/peers establishing successful careers in a particular field, then it's hard to see that field as offering a viable opportunity for you. It becomes "a thing that men do". As endofanera, wrote, it is something of a self-reinforcing stereotype.

I've never experienced (or recognized) any overt or subtle gender discrimination. But, I imagine that it would be more difficult for a woman in recording industry, which seems far more male-dominated than the computer industry and where there is a more "who you know"/social dynamic at play in getting jobs/gigs.

I just don't think that in this day in age women can say "gee, I'd really like to become a recording engineer but there are lots of guys doing it so therefore I must not be able to?" That makes no sense.

sndo wrote:I just don't think that in this day in age women can say "gee, I'd really like to become a recording engineer but there are lots of guys doing it so therefore I must not be able to?" That makes no sense.

Most people just do what they see other people doing. It's like that job is just not on the person's radar. It's not that someone says "I can't do it". They just don't necessarily think of themselves doing it.