Abstract:

In all complex societies, gender identity and gender relations are a central element of a multifaceted social structure. In the context of the 2015 European migration crisis these relations constituted a forum of encounter between migrant and native cultures which sometimes escalated in conflict and was framed by media in more or less dramatizing ways. The research project Gender – Integration – Gamification (GIG), conducted by an interdisciplinary consortium of social scientists and adult educators who work with migrants, analysed these cultural encounters of immigrants from Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq with the gender order of Austrian society and re-interpreted it in terms of opportunities of informal learning and (various forms of) integration. In the course of the project, we developed a prototypical digital learning tool, including gamification elements and videos, to reflect learning experiences and one’s own gender identity in the light of normative expectations prevailing in contemporary Austrian society. The learning tool presents every-day life scenes of gendered activities in work, home and leisure contexts. The protagonists directly address users and invite them to engage in interaction. Some questions about gender values, norms and about personal emotions follow the video sequences. Evaluating the usability and the educational potential of the tool, we interviewed male and female individuals of our target group, some of whom participate in education programs for migrants, and asked them to think aloud while using the app. Findings suggest that participants know quite well about gender related social expectations. However, often they did integrate them with their own gender-related attitudes, which sometimes contradict normative expectations. Sometimes they reflected on the differences between values and observed behaviours in their social environment; sometimes they were not aware of contradictions between socially expected and spontaneously expressed thoughts about gender, displaying an inconsistency of internalized cultural patterns. Such inconsistency, however, is a well-known characteristic of systems of relevance in the social world of everyday life. We conclude to use our gamified digital learning tool cautiously in its current stage of development. Further development to use it as a stand-alone application is necessary. We think that it works best in a dialogical setting in which users can discuss and reflect gender issues and gendered identity.

Keywords:

Gender, identity, integration, digital learning tools.