Welcome back after lunch, the topic that I am engaged in for this course is something that is usually not taught or learned as part of technical communication skills. But in today's globalized world, these skills are considered to be very important both for written and oral communication, both in technical communication as well as workplace communication. And those of you who attended, who saw my video lectures would know that I also cover a bit about issues related to gender and diversity in teaching. So this particular module that we also teach for our students here in IIT focuses on gender and diversity, but this module is particularly focused on STEM disciplines which is science, technology, engineering and mathematics since this course is specifically meant for these disciplines. In IIT of course when we teach this, we also include students from other backgrounds including management, humanities and social sciences and so on. So what we plan to do in this tutorial till 3.45, till 2.45 and then the next session till 4.15 is to review some of the things that were covered in my lectures and also to work out some problems and solutions. So we will do some tutorials as well. Also since we had given some assignments, I plan to engage in discussion with some of you who would have attempted these assignments so that we can mutually learn from each other. So in the lecture I have explained that STEM refers to science, technology, engineering and mathematics and one of the objectives of this particular module is not only to develop an understanding of science, technology, engineering and mathematics, but how diversity issues matter in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. We know that these four broad disciplines, the people who work in these areas both in teaching and research mostly come from very very narrow stream of socio-cultural backgrounds and in countries like India which are still developing countries, it is very essential that we bring in people from as many different diverse backgrounds as possible into these fields because these are seen to be very important to contribute to issues of development that we have discussed in the lectures. So we have also covered in my video lectures why STEM disciplines are important for society at large and why addressing gender and diversity issues are important and relevant in education, pedagogy and communication. So how we teach these four STEM disciplines, what we teach, how we learn, these make a difference to how different kinds of people, men, women, people from different ethnic, cultural socio-economic backgrounds, they take up careers in STEM. So there is an immense amount of research around the world which shows that the more diversity we have of people working in STEM areas, the more creative and innovative is the output and therefore the greater the benefit for society. So bringing gender and diversity issues into STEM communication is important because we want to go beyond western, male, middle or upper class scholars and enable everybody in society to learn these disciplines and benefit from them. We want to open it up to other groups who are under represented in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Also one of the issues which is currently debated in a big way around the world but especially in the United States that President Barack Obama, for example, has talked about how the number of students getting into science, technology, engineering and mathematics is coming down and they are actually scared that Asians, people of Asian, Latin American origin are tending to dominate STEM education in the US and people who are of European origin or Anglo-Saxon origin in the United States, they are moving to other areas which are more lucrative financially like law and finance and so on but less in STEM. So this is seen as a crisis. In India of course this crisis is of a different kind because in India as an emerging economy as a developing country we know the importance of science, technology, engineering and mathematics for issues of development for technological development and so on. But we do know that because of past historical practices of discrimination, inequality and so on the majority of people from the majority of communities are under represented in teaching and research with reference to these disciplines. In the IITs particularly we are very conscious that the number of women students who come to study engineering are very small only about 10 percent whereas if you, if they should be represented according to their proportion in the population they should be between 45 and 50 percent. So here communication matters because the language we use, the words we use, the terms we use, the concepts we use when we teach science, technology, engineering and mathematics the overall communication strategies we adopt these have an impact either on reducing the inequalities and prejudices of society or on enhancing these. So while society may have certain limitations because of which the inequalities in society carry forward into our education whereby we find that the number of women for example in higher education is very low, the number of women as scientists is very low, number of women as mathematicians is very low and so on. So we do not want the existing inequalities to carry forward into our own education and research systems. So we want to use our communication strategies to avoid bringing the existing prejudices into our systems. Just to give you a couple of examples which I have covered in more detail in the video lectures how do we cover different topics or themes. So one of the things that I talked about there is that there are certain non-stereotypical areas which are conventionally not covered when we talk about science and engineering. So in chemistry for example how many of us talk about what happens within the kitchen as chemistry. In Hindi for example those of you who know Hindi will know that there is a common root for the kitchen and for chemistry. So in chemistry is Rasa and Shastra and kitchen is Rasoi. So there is what happens in the kitchen is actually chemistry but somehow we think that that is not science and therefore the various issues related to chemical processes, issues related to sanitation, hygiene, food, nutrition, medicine, health all of these are very integrally related to what we do in the kitchen. So we do but we do not cover that when we talk about chemistry. So what we are saying is topics and themes have to be covered in a non-stereotypical way so that everybody is encouraged to think of science, technology and engineering. Similarly with housing as well. So I had a student for example a couple of years ago in an environmental studies course which I was teaching who was from an underprivileged rural background and he was doing civil engineering here. So one of the things he was interested in because of his own background was low cost housing but most of the faculty members were simply not interested in that. So he came and asked me you know why is it that I am interested in this. This is very important as a development issue for the country but nobody wants is interested in guiding me on this particular topic. So what is happening in these examples is that the inequalities in society are coming into how we do research, how we think of research, how we think of scientific topics. That is what we want to avoid through our communication strategies in the classroom and through in our research areas. Now I also spent a little bit of time in my video lectures talking about what is unique and different about the STEM approach. The STEM approach is not simply about thinking of science, technology, engineering, mathematics in discrete ways that is as in separate silos as Professor Fatter keeps talking about quite often he is very critical of that silo kind of approach. The STEM approach tries to integrate all these different disciplines and teach them in an integrated way. We also learnt about how we can cross disciplines that is when we as for example as a mathematician if I am looking at engineering I do not simply bring my mathematics to an understanding of engineering. I modify my own understanding of mathematics because of the need to apply mathematics in the engineering context similarly with all other disciplines. So we want to make sense of the world in a holistic manner because of which communication needs to understand the social context of all these disciplines. Why are we doing this research? Why are we teaching this? Why are we developing engineers and technologies? So bringing in a social consciousness naturally means both understanding the inequalities in society and avoiding the consequences of that for our own communication. So just to you know contextualize the issues related to gender and diversity and STEM communication to India I want to bring in something here which I did not talk about in my video lectures but which has recently been in the newspapers. So and but this is something that has been discussed quite often in the past also in India and other countries. This is with reference to trying to understand why there are so few women in management, why there are so few women in engineering, why so few women get admission into IITs or IIMs. So some people have tried to argue that this is because of an excessive focus on quantitative skills as an important requirement to both get admission into these institutions and to take up these career options. But then a lot of research in India and in other countries have shown that the educational aspirations and achievements are not simply about skills. So a lot of research in India itself has shown that up to high school girls students tend to perform better than boys almost everywhere in India in science and mathematics. But yet they almost completely disappear when it comes to higher education where do they go? Is it because of lack of skill or is it because of social issues? So here I do not want to get into a sociological discussion. I want to talk about how communication can be a very important aspect of understanding this problem and addressing this problem. So here it is said that both in school and college as well as at home there are certain stereotypes that men or boys are better at understanding concepts and understanding while women are better at mugging up our road learning. This is a completely unscientific thing. There is no study which shows this. But because this stereotype is there we sort of discourage women from taking up certain career options or expressing their interest in certain kinds of disciplines and that is the communication issue that we should address while talking to both boys and girls in our own education systems. Likewise in terms of posing problems which are equally challenging. So sometimes teachers are guilty of saying of giving simpler problems to women because we think they cannot do certain kinds of problems. So in the recent discussions about this in India for example show that almost every major and public sector bank in India is headed by a woman which completely demystifies these kinds of myths. Most of the public sector oil companies in India are headed by women. Most of the huge FMCG companies Pepsi and so on are headed by women. Yahoo is headed by women. So these are all stereotypes which if we overcome we can enable more women to come into these kind of spheres or the kind of teaching we do with reference to scientific work. Everybody knows of Albert Einstein but very few people know that Albert Einstein built his extremely important insights on the basis of his colleague Emmy Noether who was a woman. Similarly women's contribution in the discovery of the DNA for example structure of the DNA are rarely talked about. So understanding these broader histories of science is very important for us to offer role models for women and men equally. Therefore the last video module that I had offered was about how we should modify our teaching how we should modify communication in the classroom to address these kinds of prejudices and to avoid these kinds of prejudices. So having given that overview of the context and background for including this module in this course on technical communication I would like to get into a bit of discussion with you now. So in the in my modules I had given you one assignment and I hope most if not all of you actually did this assignment. So here we had asked you that from your own experience as teachers or in terms of talking to other teachers and students we wanted you to write a brief statement about the kind of difficulties that student face in learning any of the STEM subjects any of the science technology engineering mathematics subjects. And then I told you to relate those difficulties of teaching and learning to the students gender may be language proficiency they may be excellent students in mathematics or engineering but they have a language difficulty or because they come from a rural background or because they have not been good schools before they came to your college and so on. So I wanted you to wanted you to write a statement on how what you as teachers did to overcome those difficulties. So I would like to now go to some of you and who would have done these assignments and I would want you to share what kind of difficulties you have faced and how you try to address these difficulties in terms of the topics that we covered in this course. So those who are ready may please raise their hands. Good afternoon. It is a common observation that in engineering institutes even today the category of women is quite less admitted students I mean. Yes go on. There is somewhere at the background that how the students will do in future when it relates to engineering specifically feels like mechanical and civil engineering. So you know these are the kind of issues that we need to address in the classroom because it was felt that you know there are certain disciplines which are hard for men for women and not so for women and the men and so on. So as of now for example if you come to IIT civil engineering department hardly anyone does any hard work. Nobody does physically hard work I mean mentally hard work of course. So most of the work in all departments is done in the computers and the laboratories one of the common complaints against a civil engineering department is that nobody goes out into the field nobody actually looks has seen a real construction. So a lot of work can be done in labs a lot of different kinds of work can be done in civil and mechanical engineering and of course women are equally capable of going out into the field to do different kinds of work. You know the Amartya Sain our Nobel Prize winning economist once made this statement that we call women as weaker section but women actually do a lot of physically hard labor. So in what sense are they weak? So it is possible that there are certain tasks that men and women could not do in the past but that no longer true technology has developed so much and there are so many technological options that men and women can equally do different kinds of work in these different subjects. So we what we should do is to try and help them to do that work better if there are obstacles one obstacle that we see is that an issue of safety or security for women in carrying out certain kinds of work because not safety from machines but safety from other human beings which are more dangerous now. So how can we ensure safety and security in different ways? How can we enable a better learning environment? So how can we modify our laboratories, our coursework, our subjects so that what is of interest to women they can take up? If we can do that then I think these kind of limitations which we used to observe earlier of women not being able to do something they can be overcome. For example we have a department of earth sciences in IIT Bombay where historically very few women would go because it was felt that women could not go into the field. Of course there are more women working in the field in agriculture than men probably lots of millions of women are working in agriculture. So that again was a myth that women cannot go into the field. So understanding these kinds of myths and trying to overcome is what we have to do in our communication. Sir that is true when we come to the learning environment and creating facilities at the institute. But since you touched upon the point of the safety and security of the woman later on going to the professional or making a career still today is a question mark for me as a parent or people like me who are parent for sending women to such an education. It's finally a question mark and that is one of the reason I feel wherein women may lack in such education hence further. So it's a point of concern. Yes, so you know that's what I've been trying to say that there is a problem in society. There is a problem with parents, there is a problem with communities, cities, transportation, all of those kind of things. But as educators, how do we make sure that we can provide the best of facilities in an equal way to everybody? What happens in society is not something that we can take care of immediately that depends on the government and a lot of other agencies. So as educators at least can we create a level playing field and then that may in the long term change how other people also address these problems. For example, I was talking to the HR manager of Aditya Birla group. So they were talking about how they would like more women to work in their factories and they were concerned that parents were not allowing these women to work. So they were also creating better facilities for women, more security, more safety, better transport so that women can come to work. And that HR manager had got this idea about equality somewhere where he himself had studied. So we are trying to make a larger difference in the longer term. So thank you very much since we want to give a chance to a few institutions. Unfortunately, we cannot engage in this discussion more. But thank you very much for that question. Yes sir. As you showed the slide previously, I would like to comment on what I experience from students who I have seen from ruler in urban areas. One of my student who came from ruler area, he was very harsh in understanding English. I conducted practicals of basic civil engineering. I found that the students were very well in understanding what I told them physically on the instrument. But what I speak with them in English, they were very difficult to find out the communication gap or understanding what I am going to communicate with them. But when I found that when I do it practically in front of them, they could repeat it, they could take the reading very well. Yes. Yeah. So that was what I experienced. So what I feel present that they are capable. Yes. But the gap only between the understanding is English language. Yes. And what they don't learn in their schooling. Yes. Yeah, thanks. That's a very interesting observation because we know that English is a problem for all of us, not only for students. It's not our mother tongue. So we all have struggled to learn English. And therefore, students may have very good abilities and skills in different subjects. But due to lack of language abilities, sometimes they lose out. So we should ensure that their learning is not affected because of language abilities. And what you're doing, I think is an excellent example because usually, if students do not understand at higher education, we expect that students also acquire conceptual and theoretical learning. That is when they can apply. That's very important. So if they cannot understand it, explaining things through practice, through experiments, or in other subjects through examples and illustrations. That is very important for students to learn. And we see that in fact, they don't say confidence increases if we use these other methods to make them understand. And eventually, their abilities including language abilities also improve. So thanks for sharing this with us. And I'm glad to know that you're actually conscious of these limitations and you're trying to overcome them. In my experience of teaching, when compared to boys, girls perform well. Okay. Regarding mathematical problems and derivative parts. Regarding boys, they can perform well in the, that is practical, practically related things that can, they can get output very easily. So we can give equal importance to both boys and girls. In Tamil Nadu, girls are very brave to face any problem. And they can even stay inside the college up to 9 o'clock, night 9 o'clock, at 10 o'clock, they can work hard. Okay. To come out as like boys. Okay, it's not just that girls are brave. Also that there is an atmosphere where I think you people must have created, where they can stay till 9 o'clock and study. I can't hear you, I'm sorry. Incorporates. But only in the manufacturing sector, still that equality is expected. There is a problem in, safety regarding problem happens in manufacturing sector. But corporates in our state used to send girls for working even during the night time. Yes. There is no problem. Yeah, yeah. So, yes, that's one of the issues also about diversity that all parts of India are not the same. And we know that Tamil Nadu is one of the more industrialized states in India. And we do have a lot of women working in industries and factories. So, yeah, thanks for the expression, both of you. And I'm glad to see that there are women faculty members who are addressing these issues of equity between men and women. And especially for the western mathematics, I think you specifically mentioned derivatives. So that's something on which actually in the United States a lot of research is being done. But now they've started in India as well that there are different kinds of subjects and different concepts. And not everyone, it's not just men and women. But there are different kinds of abilities related to how you can understand, comprehend and apply these different approaches and methods. So, understanding that different people may have different abilities and then adjusting for them in your teaching. That's very important because there may be one student who doesn't understand derivatives but who may be very good in something else. So, trying to understand the capabilities of each student, encouraging them in that and then gradually making sure they at least learn the basics of every topic. That's what we as teachers are supposed to do to address the gaps in quality of teaching. So, thanks for sharing this. In case any of you have done these write ups and you would like to share them with us, you can actually email them to us also using the system. We'll be very happy to read your statements on this and we'll be very happy to use them in our own teaching also. So, we'll do a few exercises and before that, since we covered different issues diversity and equity, that is we covered gender issues, age, disability and age. Let's go through them one by one very briefly. So, we looked at the issue of gender and one of the things we covered was the difference between gender sensitivity, gender awareness and gender neutrality. So, I explained to you in my video lecture, what is the difference between gender aware and gender neutral and in what contexts do we use language which is gender aware as opposed to language which is gender neutral and especially in our own context where technology and development are very important or currently as we are seeing disasters are affecting us in a major way. Paying attention to gender issues is important not only in terms of communication but how that communication translates into actual interventions, actual policies, how our knowledge is useful for society at large. So, I hope you did some of those exercises that we have prescribed to you. I hope you also looked to the material that we had given to you on these topics. So, based on that we can do a few exercises now so that we understand these differences better. So, we will do a few tutorial exercises now about how the diversity and sensitivity issues that we covered in our lectures and the need to avoid biases and prejudices, how this can be incorporated into our technical communication. So, let me take up these, let me give you a few questions and you can write down answers to this. Then I will come to some of your colleges virtually of course and take some answers. So, the first question is as follows, so I am giving a statement there, the first statement is anyone disagreeing with this statement should give his reasons. Now, suppose I ask you to change this sentence and rewrite it in plural to substitute the pronoun his because if we are to be gender sensitive, we have to avoid using language which where a male or masculine noun or pronoun is used as a generic term to refer to all human beings. So, the problem with this sentence is that it is using the masculine pronoun his to refer to all human beings men, women, third gender and so on. So, suppose I ask you to rewrite this sentence where you drop the pronoun his and instead rewrite in plural. So, I have given you four options, anyone disagreeing with this statement should give their reasons, all those disagreeing with this statement should give their reasons, anyone disagreeing with this statement should give his or her reasons. So, which one is correct A, B, C or D? Four options you are saying option number third seems to be the most correct. So, what I have told you is to use plural, so you are still sure option number C is the correct answer? First is my friend is saying first is the best. First is the best, what is the consensus in your college? What does the majority say A, B, C or D? Consensus is on second sir. Consensus is on second, so the consensus actually is the right answer grammatically as well as in certain terms of gender sensory, because the third option uses what is called as a pronoun pair, not a plural pronoun, thanks. The second question again there is a statement there, man's search for knowledge has led him to improve scientific methodology. So, here we are using the word man which is a noun and the pronoun him, both of them are masculine nouns and pronouns which we are using in a generic sense to refer to all human beings. So, if we have to rephrase that sentence to make it gender fair using first person, so I am going to go into a bit of grammar here using first person I, me, us and so on. So, which of the following is the most appropriate way of rephrasing this sentence? Option one the search for knowledge has led us to improve scientific methodology, the search for knowledge has led me to improve scientific methodology, our search for knowledge has led to improvement of scientific methodology. So, which one is the correct option? The answers can be one or three. Okay, that is what do the other people in your room have to say, they agree with you? We discussed and so we decided to one or three. One or three, okay, let us go back to the answer. The search for knowledge has led us to improve scientific methodology, three is our search for knowledge has led to improvement of scientific methodology. So, you are absolutely correct, both one and three are correct, okay. So, now you go to the next round, okay. In the next slide, we are saying this is the sentence anyone facing problems at the workplace should give his complaint in writing. So, this is about workplace communication, but it applies to the technical communication matter as well. So, we may give this kind of an instruction that people who are facing different kinds of problems should give a complaint. So, again, you can see this sentence is formulated in such a way that this is not gender sensitive. So, when we change the sentence using what are called as pronoun pairs. So, I have discussed this pronoun pairs in my lectures. I have also given you material about pronoun pairs. So, which of the following options is correct? Is it option four, both A and C, option three, all those facing problems of the workplace should give their complaints. Option B, anyone facing problems should give his or her complaint. Or option A, option one, anyone facing problems of the workplace should give their complaints. So, which is the correct answer? Answer two is the correct answer, second option. Okay, why is it the correct answer? Because pair goes with his and her, both together. So, we are using a pronoun pair. Okay, thanks, you are right. So, we go to question number four. The aged bureaucrat was arrested on corruption charges. So, this is the sentence that is given to us. So, we say that in this sentence, the term aged bureaucrat is considered to be inappropriate because of the four options. I think there is a mistake here. The last part of the sentence should be removed. That is actually option A. So, there are four options given here. The reference to age is not relevant. The term does not convey a proper idea about the age of the person. Older bureaucrats are not corrupt, none of the above. So, which option is correct here from the perspective of giving respect to people and from the perspective of being sensitive to issues of age, diversity and so on. So, who has raised their hand? This is Pillai Institute in Navi, Mumbai, in Panvel. Okay. Sir, answer is A. A sir, age is not relevant in this case while reporting that the bureaucrat is corrupt. Whether it is aged or not, age doesn't make a difference, sir. Okay, okay. That is so. Yeah, it doesn't. Young people also can be corrupt, no? Sir, I would like to make one more point. Yeah. And how does this answer is correct, sir? So, option A is correct, not D, because here for us the age is not relevant. We are talking about the aspect of corruption and who is corrupt. The age is something that is not relevant. So, I think when I was covering the different topics in my modules, one of the things that I was saying across different kinds of diversity is that as academics, as people who are researchers and scholars, we have to be extremely careful not only to be sensitive, but also to be very precise. So, we can only use those terms for which we have a basis. So, here age is not relevant. If age happens to be relevant, if age is something that you are researching about with reference to corruption, you can bring it. Otherwise, what is not relevant should not be brought in. So, precision and clarity is very important in technical communication. But thank you for your answers. The correct answer is option A. Now, let me come back to this quiz that we are doing. So, this is a fifth question. For this, I would like to do it in a different way. Let us, we are going to use Avue to take your answers. The revamped poverty reduction program is likely to benefit 50 million people, second statement is revamped poverty reduction. Program is likely to benefit 50 million men and women. So, I am saying that statement B is preferred to statement A because, so is it because it is gender neutral? That is statement B. Is it because it is both gender neutral and gender aware? Or number three, it is gender aware or none of the above? So, we have so far received how many answers? 64. So, out of 98, roughly half has given C as the answer that it is gender aware and that in fact, is the correct answer as well because it uses the way it refers to both men and women. It is aware that these benefits can be different for men and women. So, the rest of you do not have to get disappointed. You will also get correct answers. Question six, we will also create an Avue poll for this. This is about the reference to people with disability. So, we are going to give you four titles of articles from journals, from science and engineering journals as well as public policy journals. So, the names of the titles of these four articles are there. You have to tell us which one is correct in referring to people with disability, which means the others are incorrect or wrong. A is the title of the article is EMG based high level human-robot interaction system for people with disability. Robotics, the second one is robotics and its role in helping disabled people. The third is towards the characterization of building occupancies for fire safety engineers, prevalence type and mobility of disabled people and the fourth one is a policy article closer to home, a critique of British government policy towards accommodating learning disabled people. So, which one is correct in terms of the currently acceptable appropriate ways of referring to people with disability? Can I just go to some of you and ask you the correct answer? The first option I think is correct. So, because in that case the disability is milder tone. The other sentences they are very prominent about what kind of disability, but in the first one the pinch is a milder one. I mean they do not mention the disabled people, but people who have disability. The rest of you, do you agree with her about A being the correct answer? Is there somebody who says she is wrong? Okay, nobody. Okay, I will just tell you in a minute whether you are right or wrong. Can we take up another college? Sir, you are saying that instead of using his or her, we can use plural like they. Correct. Why do not we use once? Once. Once attitude like this. His attitude or her attitude. Why do not we use one's attitude? Yes, we can do that also. So, there are many different ways in which one could avoid gender bias language. So, one could use plural pairs, one could use pronoun pairs, one could use plural nouns, plural forms of nouns, one could use pronoun pairs. One could also use these kinds of terms to refer to oneself as ones and so on. So, that is why it is so mysterious, why people continue to use gender insensitive language when there are so many different options. So, you have given us one extra option. So, thank you for that. We can do that as well. So, I was just giving you an example of a plural way of doing it, pronoun pair, but this can also be done. Let me get back to my question. So, the correct answer is A, Bhuvaneshwar college answer was correct, but the reason was wrong. The reason why it is correct is that if you remember what I mentioned to you, a person is not a condition. So, disability is a condition, but there was an advertisement I saw in the newspaper yesterday. Yesterday was if you remember, if you know the international day for persons with disability. Did you know that? It was there was a lot of advertisements in newspaper yesterday or day before, international day. So, one of the advertisements said disability is only a piece of the person. This only disability is only one part of who you are as human beings. Therefore, we should not reduce an entire human being to a disability. So, if we say disabled person, the disability is coming first and person is coming later. Since a disability is a condition, a person is not a condition.  Handicap or disability should come later, the person should come first. That is the reason why option A is the correct answer. So, thank you for your responses. Let us go back to the slide. Which one of the following does not follow an appropriate way of referring to older people? So, in the earlier examples, we looked at age, we looked at disability and we looked at gender. Let us take up one more example of people who are older. The question is, so I am giving you again four titles of articles from journals. So, remember I am asking you not which is the correct way, but which one of the following does not follow an appropriate way of referring to older people, which is not appropriate. I am not asking you the correct answer, I am asking you which is not appropriate and then you can explain to me why it is not appropriate. The first option is a multifactorial intervention to reduce the risk of falling among elderly people. Second one is hip fractures in the elderly. The third one, atrial fibrillation, a major contributor to stroke in the elderly. And the fourth one is observations on the brains of demented old people. So, all four are from medical journals. So, the answer is from our side is fourth, because we are in the people like the word that demented. So, I guess we are abusing like the older elderly people by saying they are demented. So, from our side of consensus, it goes forward to the option. Okay. So, hip fractures in the elderly. The elderly demented old people on elderly people. Yeah. So, can I take one more answer from another college? According to us, the answer is number D, because we cannot call the elderly people as the relented one. Okay. All of you agree on that? Because we are not, they are elder than us. So, we cannot give them such, we have to give them some respect, we cannot call them relented. So, let us just look at the options again. So, you see the first one refers to elderly people, second one refers to the elderly, third one refers to the elderly and the fourth one is demented. So, the answer to this is a bit complicated, because my purpose is not just to get an answer, but also to explain certain things. So, you see in option A, what we have done is to add the word people. So, I mentioned to you in my lecture that adding the word people that is giving it as a suffix when you refer to the elderly denotes respect. Likewise, prefixing any reference to the elderly with the definite article D, T-H-E-D that also denotes respect. So, from that point of view, A, B and C are appropriate. Now, one could argue that D is the inappropriate one, because we are referring to them as demented old people. And this is partly correct, your answer is partly correct, partly wrong, because dementia is also a medical condition among the elderly. So, the way in which it is used here is the problem. So, demented is used in a pejorative way, demented is used in a negative sense to refer to people who are older. So, saying demented old people is inappropriate. The correct way would be old people with dementia. So, the article actually is referring to the medical illness referred to as dementia, but because they refer to, they use the word demented which is used popularly also in a negative way. Therefore, it is an inappropriate. The correct way would have been to put the people first and the medical condition dementia later. So, both of you have got the answer correct. Congratulations. Now, we are coming to the end of this particular session. So, I would like to get some general responses from all of you, both to my video lectures and to the exercises that we just did. So, about issues of diversity and equity and how to bring in greater sensitivity into our communication, technical communication. I would like to know three things. What did you learn from this particular module? Why do you think this is important? And after learning these things, whether there has been any change in your own communication. So, I would like responses from all of you and I am going to note them down here. So, our objective here is not, this is not a course like a regular college where students need to pass an exam. So, we are trying to make a change here. That is the whole point of this course that we need to modify. We need to become better at how we communicate. So, from this particular module, what is it that you have learnt and why do you think the changes in communication that we are suggesting in this particular module are important and whether any change is actually taken place and if so, in what way. So, we have gone to SIS College Nehru, who wants to speak up? The decision was definitely an eye-opener and we learnt a lot. First thing we learnt was various issues related to STEM. What is STEM exactly? And STEM and its application not just in technology and engineering studies, but in our day-to-day lives as well. We are just getting out of the stereotype. And that was one very good issue and of course, the general bias that we come across, we all face, not we, but our students do come to us various issues related to general bias. So, how that can be resolved again, that information is a question. So, my colleague would like to ask a question regarding the general bias. I have one question regarding transgender. Now, what is transgender? We are including this as a third option even in forms, admission forms or anywhere else. So, you talked about pronoun pair. Yeah. He is or her? Yes, correct. Now, there we need to introduce one more option if we are used nowadays, which we are giving as third option. Yeah. So, do we need to have some dramatic changes in our grammar? Yeah. Or something like that? Yeah. How will you address this issue? Yes, yes. So, this is an important question that I am also being asked these days. So, it took us many years and decades to make the language gender sensitive between men and women. But of course, we are also talking about third gender, trans gender and so on. And we are also using was like other gender. So, as the reason I did not cover them is that as yet we do not have accepted norms where we can modify language used to refer to other gender. We do have we are modifying the forms nowadays, you know, very many forms that we have in schools, colleges, government forms and so on. They are used including an option for a gender other than male and female. But in terms of grammatical changes that we require to refer to these other genders, still many scholars are discussing and debating about what is the best way without modifying the meaning of a sentence and without making the sentence more confusing without losing clarity. So, in that way, slowly we are trying to develop protocols or strategies wherein we can refer to these other genders also. But I have not covered it so far because there is no consensus on this. So, the only advice I would give is without losing clarity, if you can find out ways in which you can also include references to other gender, please do that. It is also very important to do that. So, thank you for that question. Your session is very nice and I must thank you for bringing this topic into the field of technical communication. Some language, foreign experts who write books on business communication, they bring in general issue as well as the culture and communication, culture as well as the legal aspects and communication. I think this is a very important task to be dealt with, though we are not covered it in the syllabus. We teach a course on technical communication here for our students and I will spend some time in teaching this also. Another thing I want to add here is you referred the his or her as the pronoun pair. This is also called the western language experts call it, this is a new name I am learning, the pronoun pair is very good sir. The western language experts call it bulky pronoun and they say it must be avoided by using a plural, sir. That is very good. That is another option they are giving. Yes. So, this you are the thank you for this input. It is referred to as a bulky pronoun. Yes, not all of us are aware of this. So, I thought it will be easy to use the word pronoun pair. But it is in fact many things which we thought of as grammatically correct those things are changing now. So, you know because the bulky pronouns that you mention they these kind of terms we were taught in our own childhood to avoid earlier because they made the language a bit more heavy it made them complicated and so on. But in the interest of gender sensitivity nowadays we say that these kinds of usages are acceptable. In fact, in we were all taught in school that we should avoid passive voice and use more of active voice. But I have not I do not have enough time to give that example here. But if you look at some of the material on gender sensitive language including the UNESCO book that I recommended to you which I have uploaded I think for you there also they say that in the interest of gender sensitivity you can actually use passive voice also. So, that helps you to circumvent this problem of referring to a particular gender. So, thanks for that input. Yes, this is from Kishnari. Very happy your session is very useful for us. Our participants feel very very useful. Before that before your session we were not having that much of importance for gender sensitization. So, we learned many things about how to refer he, she especially how not to discriminate between he and she. So, these things are very useful for us. So, we feel very what is called interesting and also a much importance for that particular gender issues. So, can you can any of you are any of you willing to share with us in what way your communication has changed after going through these modules on sensitivity, equity, there are diversity and so on. Thank you sir. Actually, after attending this program actually the technical communication especially this title which is covered by you related to this gender and diversity in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. It would help us help our faculty members to be very clear in certain aspects of this technical communication. Definitely it will help them in future for communicating with the peers and then to the world especially. And then not only to this particular topic, the topics which have been covered for the past four days or so will really help us to improve our this technical communication in case of writing the papers or abstract writing and other papers. Okay. And then for the researchers for doing research will definitely help us. Then another question is there my doubt is a is there any specific place which you can tell us where you still find this gender and diversity which is problem arises. Problem of course exists everywhere. With your own experience can you give us an example sir. See I think examples can be given by everyone sitting in your room. So, what I am saying is it is because these problems exist that we are talking of the need to modify our communication strategies. So, the important change that is occurring in all our societies is that where earlier the people who were part of science, technology, engineering, research, teaching and so on they came from a very few selected communities. Now as society is democratizing we have both men and women and we have more people from different groups, different backgrounds coming into all kinds of professions. So, that means that the diversity of the population working in any particular organization is increasing. Therefore, the need to address gender and diversity concerns is more. So, it is possible that in some places some institutions the inequalities, discriminations are less in some it is more it depends on the culture and so on. So, the problem actually exists almost everywhere both consciously and unconsciously. But as far as the I am not sure if you are asking whether in some places it is more, in some places it is less. So, we clearly see that where people are more aware of the need to address these inequalities issues their communication strategies are different. So, in our own institution for example, me and a colleague of mine about 15 years ago organized this workshop on gender sensitive communication. And since then we see there has been a huge difference in how people use language in context where both men and women are working in this workshop. Also we have teachers, what if forms that change sometime to come. So, basically our idea is to make that change happen and naturally we see that when they change their communication when you see different kinds of forms where both men and women are given importance and so on then people's own consciousness also increases. So, thanks for that question and also for you know thanking also for telling us that you found all the modules very useful. And you also mentioned that these are useful as a researcher. I think that is very important that we want to highlight and it is something that professor Fatak mentioned very early in the introductory session and he has been this is something he has been stressing because it is not simply about you being able to communicate better. We want that all of you in your respective colleges also become good researchers. In fact, another faculty member who inaugurated this workshop earlier, Professor Kannan Maudgaliya that is one of the common themes he talking about he keeps talking about in IIT all the time that the quality of research in colleges also has to be substantial. So, part of the factors which made us choose particular topics in this technical communication course is to enable you to become communicators with reference to publications. So, we want you to become better researchers and to produce better research output also and I am very glad that you brought up this issue. Thanks for that and we will continue this discussion after 5 minutes. So, see you in 5 minutes.