Abstract
In the context of a class is of pre-service, undergraduate educational technology, primary and secondary majors, the author explores feminist theories and post-structuralist theories regarding gender dichotomies to better comprehend how young women have internalized cultural biases informing them that computers are masculine artifacts. The issues are addressed in both in-class discussion and online forums. Because discursive norms tend to favour masculine voices, the author used Computer Mediated Communication (CMC) to disrupt assumptions regarding public/private discourse by intentionally structuring these spaces to limit aggressive rhetorical attacks (i.e. flaming) that young men are more apt to use than young women. The results so far have proved encouraging. The author elaborates on these successes by comparing differences from female and male contributions to a post-class, open-ended (qualitative/ethnographic) survey.
