CLOSING THE TECHNOLOGICAL GENDER-GAP - FEMINIST PEDAGOGY IN THE COMPUTER-ASSISTED CLASSROOM

Feminist Audre Lorde states, ''The master's tools will never dismantle the master's house.'' In this paper, however we encourage women to se ize computer tools for their own educational purposes in order to coun teract the ''null environment'' they experience in the traditional cla ssroom. We argue for a proactive feminist pedagogy that enhances women 's computer learning by demystifying the computer and promoting techno logical equity in the classroom. To accomplish these goals, we introdu ce a quantitative and a qualitative software program which help to cre ate a proactive environment that enhances women's computerized learnin g when used in conjunction with feminist pedagogical techniques. We al so discuss the implications of introducing feminist proactive computer learning into the sociology curriculum and, more specifically, into t he women's studies classroom.