Teacher Identity and the Teaching of English as an International Language

A discussion on the last chapter of Phan Le Ha’s Teaching English as an International Language –

Identity, Resistance and Negotiation

By: Ratri Wahyuningtyas | ratriewahyu@yahoo.com

Ha’s Suggestions for TESOL students

O Dividing students into groups. Goal: focus-group discussion, give feedback to teaching staff

O Encouraging students to write about their identities. Goal: raising awareness and negotiating identities for self development

The Construction of the Vietnamese Identity

O The Western-trained EIL Vietnamese teachers experience changes in their identity

O Identity + exposure to new context = changes

O Results: negotiating their identity.O Their identities: Vietnamese

national/cultural identity, Vietnamese teacher, Vietnamese student

O Later, their identities continue to be shaped and reshaped

O They negotiate the existing values with the new values

O Final: present themselves through multiple identities >> hold on together on the basis of a shared professional and national identities

Morality in Teacher Identity Formation

O Moral >> functions as identity filter and core identity

O Teachers saw themselves as moral guides and morality demonstrators

O Morality and ethics seen as criteria to differentiate Western and Vietnamese values

Identity Fastening, Unfastening and

RefasteningO It will occur when people are in different

culture and societyO As a result of negotiating and

compromising when facing tensionsO BUT, changes do not mean NEW identityO There is a process of ‘being’ into

‘becoming’ identityO Important things >> the ability to

control, adjust and negotiations during the process

Identity and DifferenceO In the process of negotiating identities, it seems

that their core identity is the one that is strongly shown

O It sparks out their sense of belonging, their difference as Vietnamese teachers and also their commitment to demonstrate morality

Daughter-in-law of a Hundred Families’ in the

Teaching of EILO Playing hard to ‘please’ all partiesO Expressing how difficult to play role

as teacher in the society that judge all activities done by the teachers

O Teachers have to perform morality which responds to social, cultural, professional expectation of teachers and also the potentiality of negative effects of global on local/national pedagogical values and practices

To ConcludeO Identity is multiple and dynamicO The interpretation of values and practices might

be different based on people’s knowing and position

O Identity is not one stable entity nor changing and fragmentation

O Identity includes continuity, flexibility, connectedness and all create dynamic changes.

O Identity is about ‘being’ and ‘becoming’

Ha’s Identity?O Ha has multiple identities that

dynamically shaped, changed, reconstituted and developed along the lines of existing and persisting identity and it is always on-going

Thank You