Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-cb9f654ff-rkzlw Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-08-11T05:15:37.562Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

9 - Mothers of invention? The myth-breaking history and planetary promise of women's key roles in subsistence technology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 December 2009

By
Rae Lesser Blumberg
Edited by
Yair Amichai-Hamburger
Yair Amichai-Hamburger
Affiliation:
Sammy Ofer School of Communications, Interdisciplinary Center, Israel
Get access

Summary

Technology is usually depicted as masculine: from stone tools presumably made by men for men's pursuits to men building rockets that reach the moon and beyond. This overwhelming identification of men and technology is one of the reasons so few girls dream of or enter engineering, even today. Enduring a dream denied, or being treated like an outsider in one's chosen field, negatively affects one's psychological well-being. In this chapter, I suggest that the conventional wisdom that has helped deter many women from greater engagement with technology is misleading or wrong.

Instead, I argue that for almost all of human history – and among our nearest nonhuman relatives – we have been closer to equal opportunity in technology, indeed, to the “mothers of invention” model, than the stereotyped notion of “technology=male.” I further contend that this has contributed to human well-being, both material and psychological. To support my thesis, I will trace female/male contributions to what Gerhard Lenski has argued since 1966 is the most crucial of all forms of technology: subsistence technology, or how we make a living from our planet. This entails examining my version of Lenski's “modes of subsistence.” I call them “techno-economic bases” to highlight the linkage between technology and economy in our past, present, and future.

I posit that humans' “historical main line” has consisted of only four major bases and that a fifth may be emerging in today's globalized world: (1) foraging (hunting and gathering); (2) horticultural (hoe or digging stick cultivation); (3) agrarian (plow-based); then – following the rise of capitalism – (4) industrial.

Information

Type
Chapter
Information
Technology and Psychological Well-being , pp. 227 - 259
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Book purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Baumann, H. (1928). The division of work according to sex in African hoe culture. Africa: Journal of the International African Institute, 1(3), 289–319.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
,BBC News (2008). Women to rule Rwanda parliament. Sept. 20. Retrieved September 20, 2008, from http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/mpapps/pagetools/print/news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7620816.stm.
Birdsell, J. B. (1968). Some predictions for the Pleistocene based on equilibrium systems among recent hunter gatherers. In Lee, R. and DeVore, I. (Eds.), Man, the Hunter (pp. 229–240). Chicago: Aldine.Google Scholar
Blair-Loy, M. (2003). Competing Devotions: Career and family among women executives. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1978). Stratification: Socioeconomic and sexual inequality. Dubuque, IA: W. C. Brown.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1981). But Are We Helping the People? Washington, DC: Agency for International Development/Asia Bureau.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1984). A general theory of gender stratification. Sociological Theory, 2, 23–101.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1986). Through the Window of Opportunity: Enhancing the World Bank's agricultural development project in Imo State, Nigeria by enhancing extension and incentives for women farmers. Washington, DC and La Jolla, CA: World Bank and University of California, San Diego.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1988). Income under female vs. male control. Journal of Family Issues, 9, 51–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1989a). Making the Case for the Gender Variable: Women and the wealth and well-being of nations. Washington, DC: Agency for International Development, Office of Women in Development (PN-ABC-454).Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1989b). Toward a feminist theory of development. In Wallace, R. A. (Ed.), Feminism and Sociological Theory (pp. 161–199). Newbury Park, CA: Sage.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1991). Introduction: The “triple overlap” of gender stratification, economy, and the family. In Blumberg, R. L. (Ed.), Gender, Family, and Economy: The triple overlap (pp. 7–32). Newbury Park, CA and London: Sage.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1992). African Women in Agriculture: Farmers, students, extension agents, chiefs. Morrilton, AK: Winrock International Institute for Agricultural Development/Development Studies Paper Series.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1993). Poverty vs. “purse power”: The political economy of the mother–child family. In Mencher, J. and Okongwu, A. (Eds.), Where Did All the Men Go? Women-headed households in cross-cultural perspective (pp. 13–52). Boulder, CO: Westview Press.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1995). Engendering wealth and well-being in an era of economic transformation. In Blumberg, R., Rakowski, C., Tinker, I., and Monteon, M. (Eds.), Engendering Wealth and Well-being: Empowerment for global change (pp. 1–14). Boulder, CO: Westview Press.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (1998). Gender equality as a human right. INSTRAW News, 28, 7–20.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (2001a). Adventures along the gender frontier: Encounters with gender equality in Ecuador and Thailand and glimpses in Guinea-Bissau and China. Paper presented at the International Conference on Gender and Equity Issues: Humanistic Considerations for the 21st Century, January, Bangkok. Also published in the Conference Proceedings, Bangkok, Thailand: Srinakharinwirot University Press.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (2001b). We are family: Gender, microenterprise, family work and well-being in Ecuador and the Dominican Republic – with comparative data from Guatemala, Swaziland, and Guinea-Bissau. History of the Family: An international quarterly, 6, 271–299.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Blumberg, R. L. (2002). A “natural experiment” for gender stratification theory? The Lao of Northeast Thailand and Laos. Paper presented at the meetings of the American Sociological Association, August, Chicago, IL, USA.
Blumberg, R. L. (2004a). Extending Lenski's schema to hold up both halves of the sky – a theory-guided way of conceptualizing agrarian societies that illuminates a puzzle about gender stratification. Sociological Theory, 22(2), 278–291.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (2004b). Women's rights, land rights and human rights dilemmas in East Africa. Journal of Development Alternatives and Area Studies, 23(3–4), 17–32.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (2004c). Climbing the pyramids of power: Alternative routes to women's empowerment and activism. In Smith, P., Troutner, J., and Hunefeldt, C. (Eds.), Promises of Empowerment: Women in East Asia and Latin America (pp. 60–87). Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (2005). Gender, economy, and kinship in complex households among six U.S. ethnic groups: Who benefits? Whose kin? Who cares? In Schwede, L., Blumberg, R., and Chan, A. (Eds.), Complex Ethnic Households in America (pp. 248–279). Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
Blumberg, R. L. (2006). How mother's economic activities and empowerment affect early childhood care and education for boys and girls. Background paper for Education for All Global Monitoring Report (2007): Strong foundations – early childhood care and education. Paris: UNESCO 2007/ED/EFA/MRT/PI/6 (electronic version 2007).
Blumberg, R. L. (2009). Women's economic empowerment vs. disempowerment: From the “magic potion” for development to the “four horsemen of the Apocalypse”? Paper presented at the UNESCO Women's Studies and Gender Researching Network Conference, February, Bangkok, Thailand.
Blumberg, R. L., Brachet-Marquez, V., Cortes, F., and Rubalcava, R. (1992). Women's “purse power” in the household: Reducing favoritism towards boys' schooling in Santiago, Chile. Paper presented at the meetings of the American Sociological Association, August, Pittsburgh, PA, USA.
Blumberg, R. L., and Coleman, M. T. (1989). A theory-guided look at the gender balance of power in the American couple. Journal of Family Issues, 10(2), 225–249.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blumberg, R. L., and Salazar, A. (2006). Can a focus on survival and health as socio-economic rights help some of the world's most imperiled women in a globalized world? Cases from Ecuador, Ukraine, and Laos. Presented at UNESCO Conference on Gender and Human Rights, July, Nantes, France.
Blumstein, P., and Schwartz, P. (1991). Money and ideology: Their impact on power and the division of household labor. In Blumberg, R. (Ed.), Gender, Family, and Economy: The triple overlap (pp. 261–288). Newbury Park, CA and London: Sage.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boserup, E. (1970). Woman's Role in Economic Development. New York: St. Martins.Google Scholar
Brown, J. (1975). Iroquois women: An ethnohistoric note. In Reiter, R. R. (Ed.), Toward an Anthropology of Women (pp. 235–251). New York: Monthly Review Press.Google Scholar
Bryson, J. C. (1981). Women and agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa: Implications for development (an exploratory study). Journal of Development Studies, 17(3), 29–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burger, C., Abbot, G., Tobias, S., Koch, J., Vogt, C., Bievenue, L., Carlito, D., Sosa, T., and Strawn, C. (2007). Gender equity in science, engineering and technology. In Klein, S.et al. (Eds.), Handbook for Achieving Gender Equity Through Education (pp. 255–279). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Caprioli, M. (2000). Gendered conflict. Journal of Peace Research, 37(1), 51–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Caprioli, M. (2005). Primed for violence: The role of gender inequality in predicting internal conflict. International Studies Quarterly, 49, 161–178.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clignet, R. (1970). Many Wives, Many Powers. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press.Google Scholar
Cohoon, J. McGrath, and Aspray, W. (Eds.) (2006). Women and Information Technology: Research on underrepresentation. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.CrossRef
Collins, R. (1971). A conflict theory of sexual stratification. Social Problems, 19, 3–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Collins, R. (1975). Conflict Sociology: Toward an explanatory science. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Collins, R., Chafetz, J., Blumberg, R. L., Coltrane, S., and Turner, J. (1993). Toward an integrated theory of gender stratification. Sociological Perspectives, 36, 185–216.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coltrane, S., and Collins, R. (2001). Sociology of Marriage and the Family: Gender, love, and property, 5th edn. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.Google Scholar
Copeland, C. (2006). Social determinants of high HIV prevalence in sub-Saharan Africa. Honors thesis, University of Virginia.
Cowan, R. S. (1983). More Work for Mother: The ironies of household technology from the open hearth to the microwave. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Daley-Harris, S. (2009). State of the Microcredit Summit Campaign Report 2009. Washington, DC: The Microcredit Summit Campaign. Also at: www.microcreditsummit.org/SOCR/SOCR2009_English.pdf.Google Scholar
Waal, F. (2005). Our Inner Ape. New York: Riverhead Books.Google Scholar
Diamond, J. (1997). Guns, Germs, and Steel: The fate of human societies. New York: Norton.Google Scholar
Economist. (2006a). The importance of sex, 378(8473), April 15, 16.
Economist. (2006b). A guide to womenomics, 378(8473), April 15, 73–74.
Eloundou-Enyegue, P. M., and Calves, A. E. (2006). Till marriage do us part: Education and remittances from married women in Africa. Comparative Education Review, 50(1), 1–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Engelman, Robert. (2008). More: Population, nature and what women want. Washington, DC: Island Press.Google Scholar
Faiola, A. (2008). Women rise in Rwanda's economic revival. Washington Post, May 16, A1, A12.
,FAO. (2008). Gender and Food Security: Agriculture. Rome: FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization). Retrieved June 1, 2009 from www.fao.org/gender/en/agri-e.htm.Google Scholar
Fenstermaker, S., West, C., and Zimmerman, D. H. (1991). Gender inequality: New conceptual terrain. In Blumberg, R. (Ed.), Gender, Family and Economy: The triple overlap (pp. 289–307). Newbury Park, CA and London: Sage.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fisher, K., Egerton, M., Gershuny, J., and Robinson, J. (2006). Gender convergence in the American Heritage Time Use Study (AHTUS). Social Indicators Research. DOI 10.1007/s11205-006-9017-y.
Frisch, R. (1978). Nutrition, fatness, and fertility: The effect of food intake and reproductive ability. In Mosley, W. H. (Ed.), Nutrition and Human Reproduction (pp. 91–122). New York: Plenum Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fry, D. P. (2006). The Human Potential for Peace: An anthropological challenge to assumptions about war and violence. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Geertz, C. (1963). Agricultural Involution. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Goldin, C. (1986). The female labor force and American economic growth. In Engerman, S. and Gallman, R. (Eds.), Long-term Factors in American Economic Growth (pp. 557–604). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Gonsoulin, M. (2005). Women's rights and women's rites: Religion as the embodiment of kinship and gender ideals. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Virginia.
Gough, K. (1971). The origin of the family. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 33(4), 750–771.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haraway, D. (1985). A manifesto for cyborgs: Science, technology, and socialist feminism in the 1980s. Socialist Review, 15(2), 65–107.Google Scholar
Haraway, D. (1991). Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The reinvention of nature. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Harriss-White, B. (1999). Gender-cleansing. In Rajan, R. S. (Ed.), Signposts: Gender issues in post-Independence India (pp. 124–153). New Delhi, India: Kali for Women.Google Scholar
Henderson, M. (2007). Women may have invented weapons. New York Times, February 24, 15.Google Scholar
Hubbard, R. (2001). Science, facts, and feminism. In Wyer, M., Barbercheck, M., Geisman, D., Ozturk, H. O., and Wayne, M. (Eds.), Women, Science and Technology: A reader in feminist science studies (pp. 153–160). New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
,IPU (Inter-Parliamentary Union). (2008). Women in Parliament: Situation as of 31 July 2008. Retrieved September 20, 2008, from www.ipu.org/wmn-e/arc/classif310708.htm.
,ITAA (Information Technology Association of America). (2005). Building the 21st Century Information Workforce: Groups underrepresented in the IT workforce, Task Force Report. Retrieved October 4, 2007, from web.archive.org/web/20041229120144/http://www.itaa.org/workforce/studies/recruit.htm.
Kelly, R. L. (1995). The Foraging Spectrum: Diversity in hunter-gatherer lifeways. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press.Google Scholar
King, E. M., and Mason, A. D. (2001). Engendering Development: Through gender equality in rights, resources, and voice. Washington, DC and New York: The World Bank and Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kishor, S. (1993). May God give sons to all: Gender and child mortality in India. American Sociological Review, 58(2), 247–265.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kolata, G. B. (1974). !Kung hunter-gatherers: Feminism, diet and birth control. Science, 185, 932–934.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
LaFee, S. (2007). Mothers of invention: While the men were out hunting, Stone Age women created a future. San Diego Union-Tribune, April 26, E1, E8.
Lee, R. B. (1968). What hunters do for a living, or how to make out on scarce resources. In Lee, R. B. and DeVore, I. (Eds.), Man, the Hunter (pp. 30–49). Chicago: Aldine.Google Scholar
Lee, R. B. (1969). !Kung Bushmen subsistence: An input–output analysis. In Vayda, A. P. (Ed.), Environment and Cultural Behavior (pp. 47–79). Garden City, NY: Natural History Press.Google Scholar
Lee, R. B. (1984). The Dobe!Kung. Fort Worth, TX: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston.Google Scholar
Lee, R. B., and DeVore, I. (Eds.) (1968). Man, the Hunter. Chicago: Aldine.
Lenski, G. E. (1966). Power and Privilege. New York: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
Lenski, G. E. (2005). Ecological-evolutionary Theory: Principles and applications. Boulder, CO: Paradigm.Google Scholar
Levinson, D. (1989). Violence in Cross-cultural Perspective. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.Google Scholar
Marshall, L. (1965). The!Kung Bushmen of the Kalahari Desert. In Gibbs, J. (Ed.), Peoples of Africa (pp. 243–278). New York: Holt.Google Scholar
Melymuka, K. (2001). If girls don't get IT, IT won't get girls. Computer World, January 8, 35(2), 44.Google Scholar
Murdock, G. P. (1967). Ethnographic atlas: A summary. Ethnology, 6, 109–236.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Murdock, G. P., and Provost, C. (1973). Factors in the division of labor by sex: A cross-cultural analysis. Ethnology, 8, 329–369.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
,NCES (National Center for Education Statistics). (2002). Table 282: Earned degrees in computer and information sciences conferred by degree-granting institutions, by level of degree and sex of student, 1970–71 through 2000–2001. Higher Education General Information Survey and Integrated Post-secondary Education Data System. Retrieved October 4, 2007, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%2C_girls_and_information_technology.
Nolan, P., and Lenski, G. (2009). Human Societies: An introduction to macrosociology, 11th edn. Boulder, CO: Paradigm Publishers.Google Scholar
,NSF (National Science Foundation). (2000). Land of Plenty: Diversity as America's competitive edge in science, engineering and technology, cawmset0409. Arlington, VA: NSF. Cited in Burger et al., 2007 (pp. 255–279).Google Scholar
,NSF (National Science Foundation). (2004). Women, Minorities and Persons with Disabilities in Science and Engineering. Arlington, VA: NSF. Cited in Burger et al., 2007 (pp. 255–279).Google Scholar
,NSF (National Science Foundation). (2006). First Time S&E Graduate Enrollment of Foreign Students Drops for the Third Straight Year. Arlington, VA: NSF. Retrieved June 1, 2009 from www.nsf.gov/statistics/infbrief/nsf06321. Cited in Burger et al., 2007 (pp. 255–279).Google Scholar
Oppenheimer, V. K. (1973). Demographic influence on female employment and the status of women. American Journal of Sociology, 78, 946–961.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sahlins, M. D. (1968). Notes on the original affluent society. In Lee, R. and DeVore, I. (Eds.), Man, the Hunter (pp. 85–89). Chicago: Aldine.Google Scholar
Saito, K., and Weidemann, J. (1990). Agricultural Extension for Women Farmers in Africa. Washington, DC: The World Bank/Women in Development Working Papers.Google Scholar
Slocum, S. (1975). Woman the gatherer: Male bias in anthropology. In Reiter, R. R. (Ed.), Toward an Anthropology of Women (pp. 36–50). New York: Monthly Review Press.Google Scholar
Sudarkasa, N. (1973). Where Women Work: A study of Yoruba women in the marketplace and in the home. Anthropological Papers, Museum of Anthropology, No. 53. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan.Google Scholar
Sullivan, O., and Coltrane, S. (2008). Men's changing contribution to housework and childcare. Paper presented at the 11th annual conference of the Council on Contemporary Families, April, Chicago, IL, USA.
Tang, J. (2006). Scientific Pioneers: Women succeeding in science. Lanham, MD: University Press of America.Google Scholar
Toffler, A. (1990). Powershift. New York: Bantam Books.Google Scholar
Turnbull, C. M. (1961). The Forest People: A study of the Pygmies of the Congo. New York: Simon & Schuster/Touchstone Books.Google Scholar
Turnbull, C. M. (1981). Mbuti womanhood. In Dahlberg, F. (Ed.), Woman the Gatherer (pp. 205–219). New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
,United Nations. (1987). Fertility Behaviors in the Context of Development. New York: United Nations, Department of International Economic and Social Affairs, ST/ESA/SER.A/100.Google Scholar
Wajcman, J. (1991). Feminism Confronts Technology. Cambridge, MA: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Wajcman, J. (2000). Reflections on gender and technology studies: In what state is the art?Social Studies in Science, 30(3), 447–464.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wikipedia. (2007). Women, Girls and Information Technology. Retrieved October 4, 2007, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women,_girls_and_information_ technology.
Wyer, M., Barbercheck, M., Geisman, D., Ozturk, H. O., and Wayne, M. (Eds.) (2001). Women, Science, and Technology: A reader in feminist science studies. New York: Routledge.

Accessibility standard: Unknown

Accessibility compliance for the PDF of this book is currently unknown and may be updated in the future.

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×