This article reports on the use of gender autobiography as a tool and process in courses on women's issues and human behavior in the social environment. The authors argue that despite political, social, and economic advances made by women, inequities persist, and collective action toward their amelioration has been inhibited by women's lack of understanding of and appreciation for the diversity of their experiences and contexts. The use of the gender autobiography heightens appreciation for diversity by deconstructing essentializing notions of gender while enabling the reconstruction of relationships of solidarity among women through the discovery of commonalities of experience under patriarchy. Thus, effective participation in the feminist project becomes possible.
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