MAKER: An Ethnography of Maker and Hacker Spaces Achieving Diverse Participation

Virginia Polytechnic Institute And State University, Blacksburg VA

Investigators

Abstract

Maker spaces have been widely touted as a potentially liberative moment for science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education, presenting an opportunity to bring traditionally underrepresented groups into STEM fields by engaging them in spaces that are open, creative, and supportive of people from all backgrounds. At the same time, early reports indicate that many maker and hacker spaces are already enacting certain norms that are more conducive to participation of white, male, middle-class, able-bodied hobbyists. Despite this trend, there are spaces that explicitly stand out in their inclusion of homeless makers, women, people of color, and people with different kinds of abilities. This project examines how diverse maker spaces welcome groups traditionally underrepresented in STEM, and how these practices can inform the design and operation of campus and community maker or hacker spaces that presently struggle to achieve diversity. Ethnographic methods and Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) are used to understand these spaces in terms of their physical and linguistic artifacts. This Participatory Action Research (PAR) includes ethnographies at 6 to 8 inclusive maker and hacker spaces, an Open Space Technology (OST) workshop focused on identifying and analyzing core attributes of transferable inclusive practices, and CDA that reflexively summarizes and propagates this information in applicable ways to academic and community sites. Research questions include: (1) What practices and artifacts do participants in diverse maker and hacker spaces employ to establish and maintain environments that are diverse and inclusive? (2) What does the discourse in diverse maker and hacker spaces reveal about how meaning and value are co-constructed around identity, creativity, and the culture of production / the production of culture in engineering? (3) What best practices emerge from diverse maker and hacker spaces, and how can these translate to design or transformation of existing maker spaces on campuses and in communities? Intellectual Merit: This work is early in its use of CDA, the Highlander strain of PAR, and OST, all novel in engineering education; and early in seeking to characterize features contributing to the liberatory nature of emergent diverse maker spaces. The work is interdisciplinary and potentially transformative in leveraging linguistic analysis and social theories to ferret out root causes of exclusionary STEM practices for the potential high payoff of building campus and community maker spaces (and other STEM spaces) that are inclusive. Broader Impacts: This project co-constructs ways to stimulate innovative design thinking in experiential curricula; increases retention and broadens participation in STEM by embedding inclusive practices; empowers citizen engineers through local and national networks of makers, students, and faculty; and enables new ways of STEM learning and design thinking that will enrich the U.S. innovation ecosystem through progressive learning environments for undergraduate engineers. Findings are propagated non-tradtionally via maker virtual communities, maker faires, and informal networks, in addition to traditional propagation through the STEM education literature and the network of 150 engineering deans and other academic leaders committed to making on campus.