ABSTRACT
Women's studies, feminist education, is seen as a form of existential liberation. Some writers on feminist pedagogy share Kathryn Pauly Morgan's view that role-modeling is a very powerful pedagogical device. Morgan's argument is that in order for feminist education to take place we need to develop feminist sensibility in the student. Despite some dissenters and whatever the political criticisms, there obviously still remains, for many feminist educators, an intense commitment to role models and their liberatory promise. One feminist approach to role models insists on keeping the moral faith that the role-model creation represents grounded in an honest recognition of women's difficult situations. Mary Helen Washington gives a touching account of incidents in her own women's studies classroom that indicates the many factors at work in determining who takes whom as a role model for what. The tension between tradition and progress, represented by feminism, puts a special burden on women.
