Men school teachers get bullied too: examples from an Australian study

Abstract

Studies of teachers targeted and bullied by students and parents have mostly been quantitative studies with few qualitative portrayals of the lived experience of teachers who suffer this discursively invisible bullying and harassment. The present study examines the accounts of three Australian male secondary teachers’ experiences of being bullied and harassed. Gender, in these accounts, is an ambivalent variable, simultaneously relevant yet in other ways not relevant. On one hand, these are deeply felt narratives of personal hurt and disquiet. At the same time, the structuring effects of the formal contemporary educational system is coupled to cultural changes in how teachers are positioned in imperatives of balanced class management, state education performance metrics, and shifting social attitudes and expectations. These intersections move these personal stories beyond any simple gender binary divide in how bullying impacts these individuals’ personal lives and professional teaching careers.