“It's Just a Feeling!”: Emotions and Intersectionality in Language Teacher Narratives

Abstract

Language teacher identities and emotions are deeply sociocultural phenomena. Although intersectionality has asserted itself as a powerful framework in other fields, it is just beginning to emerge in language teacher education. This article argues that intersectionality provides a powerful conceptual lens for analyzing the complex and varied connections between language teacher identity and emotions. It also claims that emotions originate in the spaces between different social factors. Specifically, the article investigates the following questions: How do English-as a-second-language teachers construct their emotions in narratives and what discourses of emotion do they evoke? How are emotions generated within the intersectional spaces of facets of their social identities? To address these, the article focuses on the micro-level of analysis and the daily emotional experiences of two language teachers. The findings show how the focal participants navigate the complex emotional landscapes of teaching and how these are mediated by the intersections of different social identity markers such as gender, race, non-native speaking status, and socioeconomic status.