Spiral Emotion Labor and Teacher Development Sustainability: A Longitudinal Case Study of Veteran College English Lecturers in China

Guoxiu Tian,Peter I. De Costa,Xiaowei Ding

doi:10.3390/su14031455

Guoxiu Tian, Peter I. De Costa + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/su14031455

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Abstract

Because the current literature on teachers’ emotion labor (EL) mainly focuses on strategies and how EL correlates with relevant factors in the educational context, EL is generally treated as static and synchronic. The purpose of this study is to explore two veteran English lecturers’ dynamic and diachronic EL development over the span of nearly two decades of their professional careers in China. Based on qualitative data that included multiple interviews, class observations, teacher reflective notes, student feedback, and institutional documents, the 18-month longitudinal study found that (1) veteran college English lecturers have mixed emotions and pervasive EL throughout their professional development experience, (2) the teachers’ EL habitus has been shaped and reshaped by their life history in personal, relational, institutional, and sociohistorical contexts, and (3) their previous EL experiences have influenced their present EL practice, which in turn tends to predict their future EL preferences. In addition, our findings revealed that effective EL effort, especially in the form of actions combined with deep acting and genuine expression, is critical to the virtuous circle of EL and sustainable professional development of college English teachers. By contrast, ineffective EL effort, particularly the long-term surface acting of depressing negative emotions without eradicating the root causes or changing the unfavorable conditions, can impede the long-term sustainability of teacher development. Based on these findings, we conceptualize teachers’ EL as a contextual and dynamic process that takes the form of spiral circles that teachers encounter throughout their professional life. These spiral circles, we add, can be virtuous or vicious in nature, and can thus either facilitate or undermine, respectively, the sustainability of their professional development. Research implications, limitations, and future directions are also discussed.

Highlights

Introduction published maps and institutional affilEducators have increasingly acknowledged that emotions constitute an indispensable part of teaching [1], and serve as valuable resources for understanding teachers’ professional lives [2]
Teacher emotion labor (EL) entails “the emotion regulation efforts that teachers [make to] negotiate the conflicts among emotion rules, educational conceptions, and their professional practice when they interact with students, colleagues, and the institution” [43] (p. 24)
We found that their EL trajectory took the form of spiral circles, and we will demonstrate its relationship with the sustainability of their professional development

Summary

Introduction

Educators have increasingly acknowledged that emotions constitute an indispensable part of teaching [1], and serve as valuable resources for understanding teachers’ professional lives [2]. There is a consensus among teacher researchers that teacher emotions play an essential role in teaching and teacher development [2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23]. It is crucial for teachers to understand and manage their emotions in and through their professional praxis and development. Beginning of career, Teaching practice, Teaching conception, Research, Teacher identity, Professional identity.

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