Heroes or Monsters: TikTok as a Counter-Space for Teacher Collaboration, Agency, and Resistance

• In Event: Teacher Identity and Agency in Racially and Politically Contested Contexts

Abstract

The positioning of teaching and teachers specifically has evolved from heroes-to-monsters, aligned with evolving policy and public discourse toward increasingly neoliberal values and teaching conceptualizations. As teachers attempt to exercise their agency within professional and institutional limitations, they face attacks on their pedagogies and personhood that reinforce the restrictive institutions and landscapes in which they work. We draw from Goffman’s (1961) total institution framework to situate the TikTok teacher community as both an educational side effect and as a counter-institution that conversely propagates teacher collaboration, agency, and resistance in the face of institutional obstruction. Using latent content analysis of the 100 top-viewed #teachertok videos, we examine how teachers employ TikTok communities as counter-institutions and spaces of agency, camaraderie, and resistance.

Authors

• Ambyr R. Rios, Kansas State University

• Angela Kraemer-Holland, Kansas State University

• Sharon D. Matthews, Texas A&M University

• Sydney F. Zentell, Texas A&M University