Emotional Belonging in Transnational English Language Teaching: A Black American Woman Teacher's Experiences in Korea

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Sunday 11:45 am - Gold 2
  In Roundtable Session: Belonging and Identity Across Borders

Abstract

This longitudinal study explores how Kayla, a Black American woman teaching English in Korea, navigates emotional belonging within transnational ELT. Conceptualizing belonging as emotionally sticky, the study examines how affective experiences attach to and orient Kayla toward (non)belonging across racialized, gendered, and geopolitical contexts. Using narrative inquiry and discourse analysis over three years, findings highlight how everyday experiences of racial stereotyping, language policing, and social exclusion both constrained and catalyzed Kayla’s professional identity formation. Scaling practices—mobilizing memories, networks, and narratives—emerged as key resources in navigating her affective encounters. This study advances understandings of minoritized language teachers’ affective, racialized labor in global ELT and calls for emotionally responsive, anti-racist approaches in language teacher education.

Author

• Jihea Maddamsetti, Old Dominion University