Doctoral Students’ Identities and Emotional Wellbeing in Applied Linguistics


Book Description

This edited volume comprises an insightful collection of international autoethnographies from doctoral candidates in the field of applied linguistics, narrating and analyzing their student experiences to problematize and challenge the dominant and oppressive cultures of academia. Through 12 select contributions, the book examines the intersection of identity work and emotional labor in the doctoral student journey, sharing insights into the potential of autoethnography for self-reflection, community building, and healing in doctoral studies. Contributors examine their doctoral journeys through personal narratives and testimonials to understand their own experiences, agency, identity, and emotions, encouraging current or former doctoral students to engage in the critical reflection of their own experiences. Chapters are divided into four themes: interrelating multiple identities, navigating and negotiating in-betweenness, engaging emotions and wellbeing, and establishing support systems. Offering unique perspectives from a global spread of Ph.D. candidates, this book will be highly relevant reading for researchers and prospective or current doctoral students of applied linguistics, language education, TESOL, and LOTE. It will also be of interest to those interested in higher education, dissertation research, and autoethnography as a method.




Doctoral Students' Identities and Emotional Wellbeing in Applied Linguistics


Book Description

"This edited volume comprises an insightful collection of international autoethnographies from doctoral candidates in the field of applied linguistics, narrating and analyzing their student experiences to problematize and challenge the dominant and oppressive cultures of academia. Through 12 select contributions, the book examines the intersection of identity work and emotional labor in the doctoral student journey, sharing insights into the potential of autoethnography for self-reflection, community building, and healing in doctoral studies. Contributors examine their doctoral journeys through personal narratives and testimonials to understand their own experiences, agency, identity, and emotions, encouraging current or former doctoral students to engage in the critical reflection of their own experiences. Chapters are divided into four themes: interrelating multiple identities, navigating and negotiating in-betweenness, engaging emotions and wellbeing, and establishing support systems. Offering unique perspectives from a global spread of PhD candidates, this book will be highly relevant reading for researchers and prospective or current doctoral students of applied linguistics, language education, TESOL, and LOTE. It will also be of interest to those interested in higher education, dissertation research and autoethnography as a method"--




Curating the Self and Embracing the Community


Book Description

This edited volume comprises a compilation of autoethnographic evocations from U.S. doctoral students in the fields of social sciences and humanities, who narrate and analyze their experiences in the doctoral journey and beyond. Through 11 select contributions, the book examines the intersections and shifting roles of the personal and the community in the doctoral student journey, illustrating the complex and unique nature of pursuing a doctoral degree. Part 1, Curating the Self, includes five autoethnographic accounts that speak directly to the personal challenges and transformations experienced in the doctoral journey. Part 2, Embracing the Community, includes six autoethnographic accounts illustrating supportive communities’ life-changing power during the doctoral journey. Contributors are: Gabriel T. Acevedo Velázquez, Ahmad A. Alharthi, Afiya Armstrong, Nick Bardo, Caitlin Beare, Rebecca Borowski, Anya Ezhevskaya, Christopher Fornaro, Melinda Harrison, Linda Helmick, Joanelle Morales, Olya Perevalova, Alexis Saba, Kimberly Sterin, Katrina Struloeff, Rebecca L. Thacker, Lisa D. Wood, Erin H. York, Christel Young and Nara Yun.




Language Teacher Identity Tensions


Book Description

Addressing the critical issue of teacher identity tensions, this edited volume looks at the tensions between teachers’ instructional beliefs, values, and priorities, and the contextual constraints and requirements. It examines how teachers deal with these tensions to avoid demotivation and burnout, which play a significant role in identity construction. Tensions are inseparable from growth and transformation but have the potential to disrupt teacher identity construction. Therefore, continual efforts to resolve tensions in teaching are inevitable. The process of resolution or reconciliation might be extended, and teachers could need support in that process to minimize the possible negative impacts on their identities. This process can simultaneously generate positive outcomes for teachers’ growth and learning. Therefore, how teachers perceive, respond to, and grapple with tensions are critical experiences that offer windows into the complexities of teacher identity negotiation. The volume paints a picture of the personal, professional, and political dimensions of teacher identity tensions in various international contexts. The chapters draw on empirical studies with clear pedagogical implications to illustrate what identity tensions language teachers face in and outside the classroom during their career trajectory, how language teachers cope with identity tensions in their professional life, and how teacher educators can integrate identity tensions into teacher learning activities. This book is beneficial for students and lecturers in applied linguistics, educational linguistics, and educational psychology. It will also be helpful of interest to teacher educators, teacher education researchers, teacher supervisors, and MA and doctoral students interested in research on language teacher identity.







Social Justice, Decoloniality, and Southern Epistemologies within Language Education


Book Description

With a strong focus on decoloniality and social justice, this volume brings together critical theories, concepts, and practices on TESOL from multiple Brazilian perspectives. The chapters showcase the work of teachers and teacher educators in confronting sociopolitical issues in Brazil, including in the domains of democracy, language education, and knowledge production, as well as prevailing issues within TESOL itself. Contributions stem from an eclectic range of analytical orientations that reflect ontological and epistemological diversity while demonstrating why, where, and how TESOL is done in Brazil. In doing so, this volume also establishes a place for Southern voices to be heard in the move toward challenging complex and long-standing issues of representation, marginalization, and exclusion that have traditionally characterised North-South relations in TESOL as a field. This volume seeks to promote Southern-based conversations about decoloniality and social justice in TESOL and will be of direct relevance to graduate students, researchers, and scholars in the field of TESOL and foreign language education.




Poetry and Pedagogy in Higher Education


Book Description

This book invites us to consider the profound impact that poetry can have in shaping personal and professional development in a higher education setting. Suitable for educators, learners, and practitioners, it offers a transformative learning approach in using poetry for teaching, assessment, research, and reflection. The book includes diverse examples, case studies, and practical exercises, demonstrating poetry's application in personal and professional development in a higher education setting. Each chapter guides readers through these processes, empowering them to integrate poetry into their own teaching and learning practices in a way that is creative, inclusive, and impactful.




African Perspectives on the Teaching and Learning of English in Higher Education


Book Description

This book brings together the work of African scholars and educators directly involved in initiatives to improve the teaching and learning of English in higher education across Africa. Offering alternative perspectives across different African countries with examples of decolonised practice in research, the book provides a critical discussion and examples of successful practice in the teaching of English in Africa. Each chapter of the book reports on a specific context and a specific teaching and/or learning initiative in higher education, with emphasis on comparability of information and on clear evaluation and critical analysis of the intervention. The editors offer a thoughtful comparison of different methods, strategies and results to provide an authoritative reference to effective strategies for English teaching and learning. The book paints a cohesive picture of the field of English language teaching in Africa and will be of great interest to researchers, scholars and postgraduate students in the areas of applied linguistics, English teaching and comparative education.




Reflexivity in Applied Linguistics


Book Description

This edited collection provides research-informed guidance on how reflexivity may be practised in applied linguistics research. Specifically, we promote reflexivity as an essential hallmark of quality research and argue that doing reflexivity confers greater transparency, methodological rigour, depth, and trustworthiness to our scholarly inquiries. The collection features perspectives from different sub-fields of applied linguistics, including intercultural communication, language education, and multilingualism, and draws on data from a range of settings, including language cafés, classrooms, workplaces, and migration and displacement contexts. Each chapter follows a unified structure: theoretical background, context of the empirical study used as a backdrop for the chapter, an analysis of how reflexivity played out throughout the study, and conclusions which include takeaway points for other researchers. This approach allows readers to gain a sound understanding of the challenges and affordances of doing reflexivity in concrete examples of applied linguistics research whilst also gaining guidance on how to nurture and report on researcher reflexivity as this unfolds throughout the lifetime of a project. This book will appeal to students and scholars in applied linguistics, particularly those with an interest in research methods in the areas of language education, multilingualism, and intercultural communication.




Narratives of TESOL Professionals


Book Description

Through insiders’ perspectives and narratives, this edited collection provides insight into the lived experiences of recent graduates of various English Applied Linguistics and/or TESOL doctoral programs in North America. The authors document how their personal and professional identities intersected during their doctoral studies and how these doctoral programs, as learning environments, supported them in their professional development and dissertation research. As such, their insider perspectives and narratives are of special value to those contemplating pursuing such a program, or are in progress towards their own degree, as well as the faculty members who advise and support these doctoral students. Chapters focus on topics immediately relevant to success and persistence in a doctoral program, such as developing a network of mentors, establishing a work-life balance, and professional socialization, among others. All authors are recent graduates of their programs who have been intentionally selected for their recent memories in navigating the process. At a time when doctoral program persistence declines at the intersection of students’ gender and racial background (see Okahana & Zhou, 2019) there is a pressing need to share the insights and lived experiences of those less commonly featured in narratives of the successful doctoral scholar. This need is especially true among TESOL professionals who will teach and learn in diverse, global settings throughout their careers following their graduation. This book contributes to that need, and it is an essential resource for scholars in TESOL/English Applied Linguistics and other similar doctoral programs.