ESP Teachers' Difficulties during Identity Constructions in a Chinese Tourism University

Abstract

The article explores the difficulties when the three ESP teachers of a Chinese tourism university construct their identities and tries to answer: what are the challenges and difficulties during the English teachers construct their ESP teacher identities? In this study, three ESP teachers from the tourism university were interviewed. The questions of interviews are designed based on Pennington's teacher identity model. The result shows that the participants’ becoming ESP teachers are complex processes of transforming professional practices and constructing professional identities. The article studies struggle of ESP teachers’ identity and display the difficulties of becoming an ESP teacher in a tourism university in the specific context about tourism.