English for Academic Purposes Teacher Identity Negotiation, Positive Emotions, and the Act of Becoming

Abstract

This reflective article presents a critical analysis of doctoral study results, which shed light on how the researcher’s perceptions as a Canadian English for Academic Purposes (EAP) educator during the sudden and dramatic pivot to emergency remote teaching in 2020 and 2021 informed his teaching realizations in virtual spaces. These perceptions were recorded in a teacher learning journal (Moon, 2006) after facilitating online classes with intermediate-level learners in March and April of 2020 and April and May of 2021. Utilizing autoethnography as a research method, the study explored how the researcher’s critical reflections as an EAP educator informed his teaching practice in the public college setting in Ontario, Canada. It also foregrounded the pivotal role that teacher emotions played in re-negotiating his EAP teacher identity and sense of professional self as he navigated the shift to virtual instruction. This article therefore weaves together the author’s doctoral research implications of EAP teacher identity and critical reflections on positive emotions and their constitutive role in shaping his professional identity roles. The study results offered three main implications for language educators: identity negotiation shapes pedagogical practices; reflecting on educators’ identity facets is closely related to their experiences of positive emotions, which can inform pedagogical decision-making; and language educators should continuously and critically reflect on the role their identity facets play in adapting teaching practices in times of major disruptions such as the global pandemic. This research paper therefore offers a critical reflective analysis of the doctoral research the author concluded in 2022 and serves as a provocation for language educators to critique the study findings and transfer pedagogical insights to their contexts.