Female teachers' professional identity and gender representation in EFL textbooks in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

Research on teachers’ professional identity has received considerable attention over the last three decades. Research studies (e.g. Cammack & Phillips, 2002; Han, 2017; Khoddami,2011; Nagatomo, 2012c, 2012a, 2012b; Park, 2009; Simon-Maeda, 2004) showed that sociocultural discourses, in general, and educational discourses, in particular, shape the professional identity of female teachers. Female teachers reported a lack of confidence, and feelings of marginalization within academia due to gendered discourses in educational institutions (Cammack & Phillips, 2002; Han, 2017; Khoddami, 2011; Nagatomo, 2012c,2012a, 2012b; Park, 2009; Simon-Maeda, 2004). Textbooks also play a prominent role inconstructing identities and normalizing gendered discourses. In fact, gender representation in textbooks constitutes powerful discourses of masculinity and femininity (Butler, 2011; Sunderland, 2004). Such discourses about gender construct roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for men and women (Butler, 2011; Sunderland, 2004). Numerous studies (e.g. Al-Taweel, 2005; Eslami et al., 2015; Gharbavi & Mousavi, 2012; Moore, 2007) concluded that gendered textbooks have a deleterious effecton the learners’ identities, including feelings of exclusion, devaluation, alienation, and lowered-expectations. Although teachers are direct consumers of textbooks, no study has been conducted so far exploring teachers’ professional identity negotiation with gendered representation in textbooks. Therefore, this study tries to bridge this gap by exploring Saudi female EFL teachers’ negotiation of their professional identity in relation to the gender representation in EFL textbooks. In this study, qualitative data was collected and analysed in two phases. In Phase I, the researcher focused on collecting data related to gender representation in EFL textbooks which are specifically adapted to suit the context of Saudi Arabia. Thus, data was collected from an adapted edition of an international EFL series by using the principles of critical discourse analysis as an analytic lens. In Phase II, the researcher explored how Saudi female EFL teachers negotiate their professional identity in relation to gender representation in the sample EFL series. Thus, data was collected from six Saudi female EFL teachers using face-to-face semi-structured interviews. The data frominter views were analysed using thematic analysis. The findings of the study revealed that the sample series was biased in terms of gender representation. The series systematically privileged male characters, while female characters in the series were disadvantaged, excluded and disempowered. Such a hegemonic masculinity discourse promoted theideology that men are superior to women. More importantly, the data from the interviews revealed that all participants were fully aware of the patriarchal discourses in the series, and they experienced feelings of frustration toward the gendered images as a result. Also, the results displayed that participant teachers’ care about their students motivated them to resistthe institutional policy and personalize the gendered images for their students. These resultsindicate that participant teachers’ professional identity was a mediation between three dimensions: their emotions, cognition, and the teaching context. The results of the study contribute to an understanding of the dynamic nature of teachers’ professional identity by shedding light on the normalized discourses that shape Saudi female teachers’ professiona lidentities. Practical suggestions for pedagogy and future research were also identified in this study.

More information

Identifiers

ORCID for Amjjad, Osama Sulaimani: orcid.org/0000-0002-9668-8043

ORCID for Aude Campmas: orcid.org/0000-0001-6662-2476

ORCID for Adriana Patino: orcid.org/0000-0003-1950-3954

Catalogue record

Export record