Nattering on the Net: Women, Power, and Cybersapce

by Dale Spender

Published Under the Garamond Imprint Multimedia, the information superhighway and the Internet have changed our world almost beyond recognition. Electronic networks have revolutionized the human relationship to time and space, and have undermined national boundaries. But what of class, race and gender boundaries? Is it true that women use technology, but men fall in love with it? Dale Spender promises to change the way we think about computers. She reveals that men are writing the road rules for the information superhighway subjecting women to new forms of sexual harassment and even data rape. Violence on the Internet is an all-too-common event in virtual reality. These are some of the problems raised by the new technologies, but Dale Spender is also excited about the possibilities of the new media. She asks, will the Internet create virtual sisterhood? Nattering on the Net is the result of many years' research during which the author made the transition from books to the Internet. She conveys her sheer delight cruising the Web and satisfying her unquenchable curiosity. She argues that it is creating unimaginable opportunities in the areas of education and authorship; the question can we use it for good?

Genres: Feminism

288 pages, Paperback

First published July 28, 1995

About the author

Dale Spender (born 1943) is an Australian feminist scholar, teacher, writer and consultant.

Spender was born in Newcastle, New South Wales, a niece of the crime writer Jean Spender (1901–70). The eldest of three, she has a younger sister Lynne, and a much younger brother Graeme. She attended the Burwood Girls High School, in Sydney. In her youthful days she was a Miss Kodak girl. In the later half of the 1960s she also taught English Literature at Dapto High School. She started lecturing at James Cook University in 1974, before going to live for a while in London and publishing the book Man Made Language in 1980.

She is co-originator of the database WIKED (Women's International Knowledge Encyclopedia and Data) and founding editor of the Athene Series and Pandora Press, commissioning editor of the Penguin Australian Women's Library, and associate editor of the Great Women Series (United Kingdom).
She is the author of a witty literary spoof, The Diary of Elizabeth Pepys, 1991 Grafton Books, London, a feminist critique of women's lives in 17th Century London, purportedly written by Elisabeth, the wife of Samuel Pepys.
Today Spender is particularly concerned with intellectual property and the effects of new technologies: in her terms, the prospects for "new wealth" and "new learning". For nine years she was a director of Copyright Agency Limited (CAL) in Australia and for two years (2002–2004) she was the chair. She is also involved with the Second Chance Programme, which tackles homelessness among women in Australia.

Reviews

[Little Danny · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting; a little dated. Impressed by the sentiment, "sexual harassment has often been... the systematic means of keeping women out of male territory, and this is certainly how it works on cyberspace." (203)