Overview

Cracking the Bro-Code addresses the increasing public concern as to why people from dominant racial and gender groups have preferential access to positions in computing. I present my ethnographic study of sexism and racism in contemporary computing culture theorized through the analytical frame of the “Bro-Code.” Drawing from feminist STS and anthropology, I share the lived experiences of women, nonbinary individuals, and people of color, including my own experiences in tech, to show that computing has a serious cultural problem.

I connect altruism, computing, race, and gender to advance the theory that social purpose is an important factor to consider in working toward equity in computing. I argue that transforming computing culture from hostile to welcoming has the potential not only to change who produces computing technology, but also the core values of its production, with possible impacts on social applications. Cracking the Bro-Code explains how digital bosses have come to operate in our society, dodging taxes and oversight with impunity, and how some programmers who look like them are enchanted with a sense of divine right. In the context of computing’s powerful influence on the world, I speculate on how the cultural mechanisms in computing workspaces sustaining sexism, harassment, and technocracy—the pervasive belief that computer technology is always needed and always munificent—impact both workers harmed by such violence as well as society at large.

“This book is a must-read for anyone who has wondered why women are still not equally represented in computer science and engineering. I highly recommend this on-the-ground look at what an exclusionary culture can feel like and, importantly, what organizations can do to improve their cultures.”

Sapna Cheryan

Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Washington

“A fascinating and disturbing thick description of gendered and racialized tech culture, Cracking the Bro Code develops a call to action for disrupting intersectional gendered inequalities in tech firms and provides what we might call an algorithm for equity.”

Laurel Smith-Doerr

Professor of Sociology, University of Massachusetts Amherst; coeditor of The Handbook of Science and Technology Studies, fourth edition