“We’re Like Visitors”

Abstract

This article examines the rise and fall of collective moral identity by two groups of unequally positioned teachers in a new school for immigrant and refugee students who were learning English. One group was composed of predominately white, US-born tenured teaching professionals. The other consisted of racially and ethnically diverse, foreign-born teachers who were participating in a cultural exchange program and had temporary visas to work in the United States for one to three years. Using participant observation and in-depth interviewing, I show how school administrators and organizational arrangements fostered the development of a shared moral identity that allowed teachers to see themselves as virtuous—if beleaguered—professionals who were doing important work. Although their identity work helped bridge cultural differences and promoted feelings of closeness between the groups, it did so by deflecting and masking inequalities in their structural positions. I show how these inequalities and the reluctance of teachers and school administrators to acknowledge them ultimately eroded their sense of solidarity and undermined their efforts to maintain a shared moral identity.