Intersectionality for TESOL Education: Connecting Theory and Justice Pedagogy

This paper focuses on the concept of intersectionality, which has been used to account for multiple forms of identity and inequality. It argues that intersectionality is a powerful theoretical lens that could be used in analyzing language teachers’ identities and their various contexts. It is also deeply connected to an orientation and understanding of justice. One significant connection that still needs to be explored in TESOL education is how intersectionality and social justice interact. Thus, the paper examines what specific professional practices educators can develop to support the critical awareness of language teachers in training. It concludes that one of the most important tasks for language teacher educators is to help current and future practitioners not only to understand the theory behind intersectional pedagogy, but to generate their own relevant, critical questions about forms of social and educational injustice in schools and other institutional contexts

“Just Treat Me As A Teacher!” Mapping Language Teacher Agency Through Gender, Race, And Professional Discourses

Drawing on a longitudinal project, this paper focuses on the micro-aspects of emergent agency in several English-as-a-second-language teachers in training with a focus on the causative social factors that mediate this construct. Specifically, as it employs multimedia narrative structures, including written texts, images, and interviews, it traces how gender, race, and culture mediate the formation of their agentive selves. These factors are not isolated from one another but interact closely. Findings reveal how the participants respond to the often stereotypical discourses of gender and race in their personal and professional relationships with others. They show that by employing multimodal spaces for unique personal, on the one hand, and larger, social positionings, on the other, the narratives provide the teachers with the opportunity for active awareness, resistance, and transformative practices. The paper and the analysis are informed by ecological perspectives on agency and Bakhtin\u27s views of relational selves and social responsibility

Narratives As Zones Of Dialogic Constructions: A Bakhtinian Approach To Data In Qualitative Research

Narratives have become increasingly important in the field of applied linguistics, as recent publications have illustrated, yet narrative analysis could still be considered undertheorized. This article outlines a specific, dialogical approach to the narrative analysis of data in qualitative research. Building on Bakhtin\u27s notion of dialogue, it claims that personal narratives are uniquely positioned to capture the interplay between humans\u27 individual and autobiographic experiences on the one hand, and larger, socio-cultural discourses on the other. Narrators can actively construct relations with others and reposition themselves on the planes of both textual and visual media. The article illuminates that through strategies such as double-voicing, narratives function as a tool for repositioning, resistance, and agency. © 2013 Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC

Multimodal Autobiographies As Sites Of Identity Construction In Second-Language Teacher Education

This article outlines a project that explores the role of multimodal storytelling in the construction of second-language teachers’ identities. Specifically, it focuses on the experience of one teacher in training. It argues that narrative spaces not only provide the opportunity for reflection, but also function as sites of empowerment and emergent agency

Exploring Second-Language Teachers\u27 Identities Through Multimodal Narratives: Gender And Race Discourses

This article has several interconnected goals. First, it foregrounds the role of narratives and narrative inquiry in the research of second language teaching practices. It illustrates how multimodal narrativity could be used in analyzing the formation of personal and professional identities of several female teachers of English. Specifically, it claims that narratives, while personal and unique constructions, can also function as bridges to understanding social and cultural beliefs. Second, it focuses on gender and race as the major social discourses contributing to the emergence of teachers\u27 in training selves. Finally, viewing both teacher identities and narratives as multidimensional, emotional, and often contradictory constructions, the article calls for their investigation from multiple theoretical perspectives, for example, dialogism, as articulated by Bakhtin (1981, 1984), and other postpositivist approaches

Dialogue In Second Language Learning And Teaching Directions For Research And Practice

The paper contextualizes the concepts of dialogue and dialogism, as outlined by Bakhtin’s framework, in the fields of second language acquisition and applied linguistics. Specifically, it shows how dialogism could be applied to three distinct, but interconnected contexts: the context of immigrant second language learners, second and foreign language teacher education, and the increasingly important area of English as an international language. The paper argues that viewing language learners’ and their teachers’ identities as dialogic constructions and, particularly, the texts they produce as examples of active dialogic activities can help researchers and practitioners understand the active, agentive nature of the process of language acquisition better. © 2013 John Benjamins Publishing Company

SSM13 - ELLE, The EndLess LEarner Videogame: An Interdisciplinary DH Collaboration

Learning a new language is difficult and time-consuming. This panel discussion will consist of descriptions of the unique research interests and perspectives from each member of the five person interdisciplinary team working to design a second-language acquisition (SLA) videogame, ELLE: The EndLess LEarner