This licentiate thesis is concerned with the development of appropriate tools and implementation of hybrid e-learning to support science and mathematics education of female students in typical rural advanced-level secondary schools. In Uganda few rural female students participate in technology and engineering education in tertiary institutions because they perform poorly in science and mathematics subjects at advanced secondary school level of education. Rural secondary schools in Uganda are usually very poor and financially constrained schools. Generally, such schools have non-functional science laboratories and libraries. They also have difficulty in attracting and retaining qualified science and mathematics teachers, especially at advanced level of secondary education. The financial situations of the schools make capital investments in science infrastructures like laboratories and libraries impossible. Fortunately, such schools can afford to acquire computers preferably with multimedia capabilities. Hybrid e-learning can be introduced in such disadvantaged schools to support science and mathematics education. The main delivery tools under hybrid e-learning are the CD-ROMs due to their superior advantages over other portable storage devices: big memory capacity, high data transfer rate, multimedia capability and widespread standardization. Used computers with inferior capabilities that are being sold to rural schools cheaply are not useful for educational purposes. The cost of acquisition is low but the total cost of ownership is extremely high. The costs of Internet installation, bandwidth, commercial platforms and web-hosting make introduction of pure e-learning in Ugandan schools not viable, even in educationally elite secondary schools. Hybrid elearnin is the only realistic option in the complex financial situation of Ugandan secondary schools. Experience has shown that where there is Internet presence for use in education, open source web-hosting providers and open source platforms must be used. They are cheap and affordable even by poor rural secondary schools. Hybrid e-learning tools were developed to support such Ugandan schools using participatory methodology. The thesis is organized in three parts. Part I consists of six chapters including background information, concept discussions, problem statement, research questions, objectives of the study and research location. A justification of the use of participatory methodology in the research is also made in part I. Part II includes the four papers upon which the thesis is based. Part III contains a brief summary of the papers, conclusions and future research.

Much has been written recently in mainstream media about sex robots. However, due to the recent developments in this area of robotic and AI technologies, few academics have critically addressed these humanoid sexual technologies through the frameworks provided by Feminist Technoscience Studies. Through utilizing this critical lens, this thesis works with the tools of becoming-with (Haraway 2004a) and intra-action (Barad 2003) to explore the ways in which sexual technologies manufactured by American company Abyss Creations are co-actors in complicated material-semiotic networks. In line with Haraway (2004a) and Barad (2003), this thesis argues that realities are made through ongoing material-discursive practices, practices which are intra-actions of desire, bacteria, companionship, synthetic cognitive algorithms, capitalism, app programing, Wikipedia, and robo-human becoming-with and becoming-without. It is through these webs of becoming-with and –without that these technologies exhibit relational agency. This thesis argues to view Abyss Creation’s sex robots in a framework of relational co-construction is to begin improving our understandings of the complicated ways in which humans, nonhumans, technology, systems, and forces are co-actors in techno-social networks.

Drawing from gender studies, cultural studies, and feminist technoscience literature, this dissertation employs an interdisciplinary approach to analyze the androcentric imaginaries through which humanoid sex robots ("sexbots") emerge. Specifically, I utilize sexbots to interrogate and reflect on issues such as consent, whiteness, and humanity. By situating sexbots as proxies for feminized and racialized humans, I argue that the production, portrayal, and proliferation of sexbots are reflections of how we treat marginalized people, reifying existing hierarchal power relations. This project begins by analyzing the creation and dissemination of sexbots by popular sex technology ("sextech") companies. Critically surveying published papers, interviews, and research from various sexbot texts, I attend to gendered and racialized discourses of sexbot consent and companionship in human-sexbot relationships. Next, I analyze the overwhelming presence of whiteness with/in sexbots, exploring how anti-Black racism manifests in sexbots, and underscoring how both the present and "future" of sextech remains rooted in the past. Then, I catalog and dissect the published materials and interviews of prominent sextech creators, critically juxtaposing the marketing discourses of sexbots and evincing how both the sextech elite and science journalists—specifically writers I refer to as "sexbot journalists"—influence, change, and inform the meanings of sexbots. Finally, I turn to robots and robot alternatives found in feminist speculative fiction, utilizing these stories as a way of looking elsewhere in order to theorize what is possible for sexbots as well as our (current and future) relationships to these emerging technologies. At its core, this dissertation is an invitation to question white heteropatriarchy mediated through the controversial existence of sexbots. While synthetic women are the ostensible "subjects" of investigation—as well as commodities exchanged by creators and subsequently praised by enthusiasts—it is the "real" feminized and racialized humans who lie at the heart of this project. Through a much-needed feminist intervention, this project offers an in-depth analysis of humanoid sex robots and what they reveal about violence and power in the world around us. / Doctor of Philosophy / Humanoid sex robots ("sexbots") have served as inspiration for countless inventors, scholars, and writers of science fact and fiction. Sexbots, as I intend to show, are also shaped by gendered and racialized imaginaries, leading to their condemnation by feminist and race-critical science and technology scholars. At the same time, sexbots are popularly advertised as suitable alternatives for human companionship, promoted as emerging technologies designed for users uninterested in, or unable to, have sexual relations with "real" or "organic" women. Interrogating the troubling imaginaries behind these synthetic women, I analyze the creation, production, and dissemination of sexbots by popular sex technology ("sextech") companies. Specifically, I use sexbots to explore urgent issues such as humanity, consent, and whiteness. Unable to consent to the acts they are programmed to perform, or combat the abuse directed toward them, sexbots are often associated with sexual and gender-based violence. By situating sexbots as proxies for feminized and racialized humans, this project argues that the production, portrayal, and proliferation of sexbots are reflections of how we treat marginalized people, reinforcing existing problems related to patriarchy, misogyny, and anti-Black racism. While this project is deeply interested in sexbots, its heart is intimately human. Ultimately, I use sexbots to critically reflect on issues of power and violence in our world, as well as to (re)imagine feminist relationships to these emerging technologies.

Using social media and norm-breaking material as an empirical touchstone this thesis elaborates, investigates and explores the entangled relationships between humans and technology in social media settings. Guided by uncomfortable, emotional and bodily online sharing the thesis gives voice to stories that are seldom heard, by people whose lives are rarely spoken of. By exploring the performative entanglements of/with/through technology, design and human intent the overall aim is to offer a critical and new understanding of our online togetherness and posthuman becoming. The conceptual framework throughout the thesis is based on posthuman theory and feminist technoscience, two closely connected theories providing a new onto-epistemological way of understanding the world’s becoming. The thesis should be seen as the product of an empirical practice of making theory about digital things, culture, humans and non-humans. By exploring diffraction and touch as not only theoretical standpoints but also hands-on methodology the thesis contributes to the development of new ways of doing research. Important findings arising from the practice of diffraction and touch are Technoemotions – conceptually agents built on a posthuman understanding of how emotions are entangled between and within the phenomenon, becoming important agents in the apparatus creating the phenomenon. Four Technoemotions seem particularly prominent in the material: Trust, Truth, Time and Embodiment. The thesis concludes by providing a discussion on critical alternatives for ethics, politics and power in relation to social media and the norms and norm-breaking practices most of us participate in. The responsibility and ability to respond are addressed, as well as social justice and hope for the future to come. / Sociala medier har för många människor blivit en naturlig del av vardagen där den digitala gemenskapen är lika viktig som den analoga. På platser så som Facebook, Twitter, bloggar och Instagram kommunicerar vi genom att dela med oss av tankar, händelse och åsikter i vår vardag. Vi varvar bilder från vår semester med politiska artiklar, delar vidare kloka citat eller resultatet från ett test av något slag, skryter på våra barn, filmar våra husdjur, delar med oss av sjukdomstillstånd och barnafödande och allt annat som en vardag kan vara fylld av. Just själva delandet är ett viktigt fundament i sociala mediers blivande och dess design är ofta optimerad för att kunna dela samma inlägg till flera olika sociala plattformar med ett enkelt klick. Denna avhandling handlar om hur vi genom sociala medier blir tillsammans på nätet, hur vi formar varandra men även hur vi formas av de tekniska scripts och den design som sociala medier är uppbyggt av. I avhandlingen får läsaren ta del av ett stort normbrytande empiriskt material. Med avstamp i detta normbrytande undersöker sedan författaren hur feministisk teknovetenskap och posthumanistisk teori kan användas som konkret metod för analys. Genom att applicera både närhet och diffraktion till det normbrytande empiriska materialet finner författaren det hon valt att kalla Teknoemotioner – konceptuella agenter som har sitt ursprung i sammanflätningar av digitala, sociala, mänskliga och icke-mänskliga material och kompositioner. Fyra teknoemotioner är särskilt framträdande, dessa är: förtroende, sanning, tid och förkroppsligande men författaren nämner också friktion och frusna berättelser som viktiga för att förstå fenomenet normbrytande delningar i sociala medier. Förtroende, sanning, tid och förkroppsligande är teknoemotioner som befinner sig i mellanrummet mellan skilda delningspraktiker i sociala medier. Dessas teknoemotioner skapar förutsättningar och påverkar upplevelser, ger indikationer om möjliga skillnader och likheter som är av betydelse för hur vi blir tillsammans med digitala material genom sociala medier. Författaren ger exempel på att det visserligen ofta är först i sin frånvaro som teknoemotioner blir uppenbara och får agens. Därmed konstaterar författaren att teknoemotioner också ofta är sin motsats. Analysen visar vidare att användare ofta uppfattar teknoemotionerna som valbara, exempelvis sanning. I sociala medier är sanning ofta en komplex agent, som ifrågasätts eller behandlat som något var och en får/kan avgöra på egen hand. Förtroende likaså. Med teknoemotionen, förkroppsligande, framgår också en tvetydighet, där kroppen (den fysiska) saknas i det virtuella rummet även om digitala kroppar är högst närvarande. Kan det vara så att känslan av anonymitet växer sig starkare om jag kan välja att vara i eller utanför min kropp?  Slutligen, tid. Tid är inte detsamma på internet som vi är vana. Där är tid ett högt arbiträrt begrepp och vi befinner oss i vår historia, samtid och till viss del även får framtid simultant. Avhandlingen avslutas med en metareflektion över hur det är möjligt att skapa kunskap om komplexa posthumanistiska fenomen där mänsklig handlingsförmåga vävs samman med digitala material och dess skilda rationaliteter. Genom att efterfråga alternativa ideal för kunskapsutveckling och design där etik, politik och makt är viktiga inslag hoppas författaren på en kritisk och alternativ förståelse av den verklighetsproduktion som sociala medier (och andra posthumana fenomen) bidrar till.

The point of departure for my research is a perceived breach and resulting dissonance between how digital games and other parts of society that are similar in form, enact certain aspects of life. This shift was made especially clear in massive multiplayer games in 2004 with the release of World of Warcraft, the design of which panders to cultural weak points, rather than attempting to mimic them. Digital games are far-reaching. In February 2019, ‘Apex Legends’ reached over 10 million players in less than 72 hours. Nonetheless, the idea of games as separate from the ‘real’ is persisting. Digital games have become a cyclopean gathering of liminality, and there are still no form-based ethics emerging, from either industry or society. Even though society is now undergoing the same abstracting digitisation, that has been a base for game design for a long time, there is a continuing separation in the knowledge applying to games or ‘reality’. The purpose of this thesis is to explore different ontological, epistemological, and ethical understandings of digital games as media, technology, modes of experience, and form. This is undertaken by using the situated and reality producing grating1 of technoscience, together with an eclectic range of concepts such as media as a message, agential reality, liminal phases, anticipation, and ergon. The research delineates a primer for applied studies within the rhizomatic structure of digital games, digitisation, technoscience, and media-technology. In accordance with this aim, the thesis has a fragmented, non-linear, and mosaic approach. This licentiate thesis is a compilation of three papers with a complementary introduction and an epilogue.

This thesis is about participation in IT design. The problem background that I have outlined is that information technologies have far reaching consequences for societies and for individuals, and that the design of information technologies is one among many practices that shape the world in which we live. From a democratic point of view it is crucial that also women should be involved in these reality producing practices. In relation to this there are at least two stories about women’s participation in IT design; one about their absence from IT design, and one about their inclusion therein. Based on this problem background the purpose of my research is to critically explore participatory IT design practices, with a special focus on gender, power and knowledge. In order to fulfil the purpose I have three research questions: Who participated in the IT design practices? How did knowledge come into being in these practices? How was responsibility enacted? My frame of reference is based on two research fields. One is Participatory Design (PD) with its focus on practitioners as co-designers in IT design practices, and the other is feminist technoscience which focuses on theories, methods, approaches, knowledge processes, and gender in technoscience practices. These two frameworks shares an interest in power relations and democratic participation in IT design. My empirical material was gathered with the help of ethnographic methods, and comes from a large IT design project in a Swedish government agency. The project was an eGovernment project, and a central objective was to rationalise the business. My focus was some (women) administrative officers who participated as business process analysts. This material was analysed with the help of feminist technoscience methodologies, foremost agential realism and diffraction. My thesis is based on five research papers, and the results of these are discussed and related to the research questions and the purpose. Based on an expanded notion of IT design and of participation in IT design, I argue that the administrative officers in the IT design project participated as central actors in the project. These administrative officers were able to participate within the context provided by various entangled sociomaterial practices, such as the project method, boundaries between business and IT, gendered divisions of labour, eGovernment, rationalisation, the project objectives, and an innovation practice. I also argue that in the project knowledge did not simply exist, but came into being as a result of entanglements of these sociomaterial practices, foremost the project objectives and the method. As a result of the reconfigured knowledge the administrative officers were removed to the periphery of the project. An additional argument is that with participation comes responsibility, and that responsibility is related to agency. Responsibility was enacted in and as a result of entangled sociomaterial practices. In this project the administrative officers were given and took a lot of responsibility within the boundaries provided by the sociomaterial practices, but they also worked to widen their agency and thus extend their responsibilities in the project. In relation to gender my argument is that the administrative officers in the project – who were women – participated as central actors, but they were also marginalised and made invisible. Thus in this IT design project women were included as central actors. As one of my contributions to PD and to feminist technoscience I want to underscore the importance of sociomaterial practices in IT design, such as IT design methods, and project objectives. These may act to restrict actors’ possibilities to act and to exert influence. Another is that knowledge in IT design practices come into being and are reconfigured as a consequence of intra-acting sociomaterial practices. Reconfigurations of knowledge might shift the power balance among actors in IT design projects and marginalise previously central actors. Responsibility too comes into being, or is enacted, in entangled sociomaterial practices. Furthermore responsibility in IT design is closely related to agency and participation, and widened agency might lead to extended possibilities to take responsibility. Additionally if positions in IT design are understood as fixed, they might make invisible more shifting and intricate professional relations and activities, and once these become visible, more women may become visible as central actors in IT design. A further contribution is that an expanded notion of IT design and participation might make women visible as central participants in IT design and in eGovernment. However, also central participants may become marginalised, as happened in this project.

The objective for my research has been to put forward and discuss some aspects of knowledge production in relation to the epistemological positions of feminist technoscience, which lay emphasis on the contextual and the social embeddedness of both research and technology. My main inquiry has been how the relation between the subject and the surrounding context can be perceived epistemologically and how this in turn can be connected to and found relevant to the supposed new mode of knowledge production termed Mode 2. The licentiate thesis is built on three essays which together form my main arguments around the epistemological questions of if and how it is possible to gain and attain knowledge, and how its value might be ascertained. In the three essays I have attempted to illustrate some aspects of and possible hindrances to understanding and knowledge, while addressing what a feminist technoscience epistemology could signify for knowledge production. My intention in these three essays has also been to emphasize the ideological foundation of epistemological understandings, its implications both on what is viewed and valued as knowledge, and on what purpose knowledge production and research should have for and in society. In relation to these discussions I have tried to underline how feminist technoscience, as a research field, should be open to ongoing discussions about its own methodological, epistemological and ideological stances and its effects on research and society.

In 2012 and 2014, two hashtags, #1ReasonWhy and #GamerGate, exposed a highly sexist video game industry that was not welcoming female participation. This was affecting women working or wanting to work in it. Feminist technoscience studies explain this phenomenon by applying theories concerning the masculine domination of our society and the perception of women as “others.” Despite the numerous challenges and struggling for inclusion, women still create video games, many as independents, taking advantage of free game engines. Hence, my aim in this thesis was to understand the interconnections between technology, specifically in the video game industry, and its social impact. I focus on the balance of male and female participation in the video game creation, the role of game engines, and the enablers and inhibitors for female inclusion, as an important component of decision making for organizational change in this industry. I conducted an inductive qualitative research approach with eight semi-structured interviews with female video game creators from the Latin American region. My findings reveal that using free/affordable technology, such as game engines, is not enough to guarantee female inclusion in the video game industry. This industry is resistant to change and tends to reinforce male predominance by hiring only a specific type of worker that matches the perfect gamer, usually young males. The participation of women in the video game creation teams (which include developers, designers, artists, testers, among others) would bring balance, diversity, new voices and fresh/new ideas, as well as women empowerment to the table. In addition, eleven inhibitors and eight enablers were identified as factors for female inclusion in the video game industry.

This research deals with the highly-relevant issue of paternalism within the discipline and practice of HCI with a particular focus on the autonomous decision-making AI technologies. It is an attempt to reframe the problem of paternalism as a basis for posthuman-centered design, as the emerging technologies have already started to redefine autonomy, morality and therefore what it means to be a human. Instead of following traditional design processes, queering as an analogy/method is used in order to speculate on the notion of technological mediation through design fictions. Relying on arguments drawn from the relevant theory on philosophy of technology and feminist technoscience studies as well as the insights from the fieldwork rather than conventional empirical design research for its conclusions, this research aims to provide a background for a possible ‘Design Thing’ to tackle the problem in multidisciplinary and democratic ways under the guidance of the ‘queer cyborg’ imagery.

Through an experimental theatre play, this thesis explores the development of human-like agency in contemporary “social robot” technology. The entrance point of this study is the gender gap and lack of diversity in contemporary AI/robot development, with an emerging need for interdisciplinary research across robot technology and social sciences. Using feminist technoscience and critical posthumanism as the theoretical framework, this research involves an analysis of a particular social robot case, currently being developed at Furhat Robotics in Stockholm. Inspired by Judy Wajcman (2004), I analyze how socially intelligent machines impact perceptions of human agency, body, gender, and identity within cultural contexts and through interaction. The first part of the empirical research is carried out in the robot-lab. The robot is then, in the second part, invited to perform as an actor in a theatre play. Entangled amidst the other players and audience members, a queered agency starts to reveal itself through human-machine “intra-action” and embodiment (Barad 2003). Human-like agency in machines is shown to be a complex matter, drawing the conclusion that human-beings are vulnerable to a myriad of entanglements and preconceptions that artificial intelligence potentially embodies.