Women Faculty of Color in TESOL: Theorizing Our Lived Experiences

Abstract

Without community there is no liberation, only the most vulnerable and temporary armistice between an individual and her oppression. But community must not mean a shedding of our differences, nor the pathetic pretense that these differences do not exist. (Lorde, 1984a, p. 112)

“I Listened to Korean Society. I Always Heard that Women Should be this Way …”: The Negotiation and Construction of Gendered Identities in Claiming a Dominant Language and Race in the United States

“…Furthermore, feminist perspectives have espoused "the centrality of gender in the shaping of our consciousness, skills, and institutions as well as in the distribution of power and privilege" (Lather, 1991, p. 71). Consequently, such perspectives have pointed to the importance of breaking the silence of gendered oppression that has stemmed from existing unequal relations (Weedon, 1987 In the field of TESOL, much theorizing and teaching in second-language acquisition and applied linguistics has been researched and recited by white male scholars; thus, the voices of women scholars, especially the voices of women of color, have been scarce (Lin et al, 2004;Pennycook, 1999). Therefore, feminist research inquiries attempt to understand women's experiences under the premise that "Women should have an equal say in the design and administration of the institutions where knowledge is produced and distributed for reasons of social justice" (Harding, 1987, p. 7).…”

Identity, language learning, and social change

“…Race and ethnicity have long been recognized as connected to identity, and several scholars have been interested in the relationship between race and language learning (Ibrahim 1999;Lin et al 2004;Curtis & Romney 2006;McKinney 2007;Kubota & Lin 2009). Ibrahim (1999) conducted research with a group of French-speaking continental African students in a Franco-Ontarian high school in Canada to ascertain the impact on language learning of 'becoming black'.…”

Racializing ESOL Teacher Identities in U. S. K—12 Public Schools

“…Several theorists have recently discussed the ways in which race interacts with teaching identity in the lives of TESOL practitioners. For professionals of color, establishing a teaching identity is often complicated by an unspoken assumption that White English teachers are more legitimate than those of color ( Amin, 1997 ;Lin et al, 2004 ;Ng, 1993 ;Curtis & Romney, 2006 ). Race is salient not only in the teaching lives of professionals of color, but also in the professional lives of White teachers.…”

“…(Katie, Afternoon Tea, November 1) Like many other women educators of color ( Amin, 1997 ;Lin et al, 2004 ;Ng, 1993 ; Lee, this issue), Katie believed that her gender and racial identity contributed to a subtext of inequality in some interactions within her professional context. Katie's personal experiences of racism heightened her consciousness of the relevance of race in the lives of schoolchildren:…”