March is Women’s History Month at Wikipedia. As a part of this year’s celebrations, Wikipedia editors in India have organised a month long edit-a-thon, workshops and other events.
Male editors at Wikipedia outnumber female ones by a ratio of 9:1. Wikipedia terms the disparity between the sexes the “Gender gap”. The edit-a-thon and other events are aimed at bridging the Gendergap — increasing the participation of women in contributing to Wikipedia, increasing the number of articles on women’s issues, and expanding them. Contributors may edit Wikipedia articles in English or their native languages. Translation of existing Wikipedia articles from English to Indian languages, or vice versa, or from one Indian language to another is one more task contributors could take up. The edit-a-thon, an online event, is open to all.
The coordination page for International Women’s Day events happening in India in March 2013 lists the details of various events and the names of articles that need to be created or expanded in English, Malayalam, Telugu, Kannada, or Hindi. Users may add to the page lists of articles that need to be created in other Indian language Wikipedias.
The previous edit-a-thon for this month was held starting from International Women’s Day, March 8 to March 10. Eighteen articles, most of them biographies of women, were created on the English language Wikipedia. One article was expanded. The next edit-a-thon is scheduled for the next weekend, March 16 and 17. The participants who sign up for the edit-a-thon will be awarded “Barnstars” for their contributions.
As a part of offline outreach efforts, Wikipedia editing workshops for women were held in Bangalore and Nirmala Institute of Education, Goa on International Women’s Day. Around 100 students of the institute and a few members of the faculty attended the workshop in Goa. Women’s History Month meetups are being held in many cities across the world.
Cross-posted at WikipeDNA and Life, The Universe, and Technology.
