TEACHING ETHICS - TELLING STORIES

In order to develop moral literacy, nursing students should be exposed both to traditional rules and justice-based ethics, and to a feminist care perspective. Justice and truth are not objective and abstract, b ut are embedded in context and are relative in nature. Nurses may be g iven the tools with which to analyse and understand ethical dilemmas f rom a justice-based view and an opportunity to tell their stories in o rder to understand the roles, motives, relational considerations and c ontextual influences on decision outcomes. If we are serious about our desire to raise critical consciousness of students and nurses in prac tice, we must attend to and join feminists in their attempts to valida te women's ways of knowing, to assist women to question their contexts , and to put aside preconceived positions and notions about moral reas oning among women.