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The Korean Association for the Study of English Language and Linguistics
[ Article ]
Korea Journal of English Language and Linguistics - Vol. 26, No. 0, pp.1263-1282
ISSN: 1598-1398 (Print) 2586-7474 (Online)
Print publication date 31 Oct 2026
Received 04 Aug 2026 Revised 03 Sep 2026 Accepted 06 Oct 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.15738/kjell.26..202610.1263

Negotiating Professional Emotions and Identities Across Unequal School Districts: A Narrative Inquiry into the Experiences of a Novice English Teacher in South Korea

Siyan Ding ; Hyerin Ryu ; Seungmoo Jung ; Huan Gao ; In Chull Jang
(First author) Ph.D. student, Department of Foreign Language Education (English Major) Seoul National University sayeon0730@snu.ac.kr
(Corresponding author) Ph.D. student in Applied Linguistics and Language Education, Department of Teaching and Learning, Policy and Leadership University of Maryland, College Park 3942 Campus Dr College Park, MD 20742, USA, Tel: +1-301-405-3324 hyerin@umd.edu
Master’s Degree Holder, Department of Foreign Language Education (English Major) Seoul National University seungmooj@snu.ac.kr
Ph.D. student, Department of Foreign Language Education (English Major) Seoul National University hannahkim1106@gmail.com
Associate Professor, Department of Foreign Language Education (English Major) Seoul National University icjang@snu.ac.kr


© 2026 KASELL All rights reserved
This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons License, which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

This study examines how a novice English teacher’s emotions, professional identity, and pedagogy were negotiated across contrasting school districts in Seoul, Korea. Drawing on an ecological framework and narrative inquiry, the study traces the early career trajectory of a public middle-school teacher who began teaching in a multilingual and low-income district of Seoul and later transferred to a school in an affluent and predominantly monolingual district under the teacher rotation system. Three retrospective interviews formed the primary dataset, while selected blog entries and school materials were used to contextualize episodes discussed in the interviews. In her account of the first school, initial emotions of confusion and frustration were gradually transformed into care, fulfillment, and growing pedagogical confidence through sustained interactions with students and supportive school contexts. These emotional experiences played a key role in shaping the teacher’s emerging identity as a caring motivator. The transition to the second school constituted a major ecological shift characterized by emotional shock and a reorientation of teaching practices toward content-focused instruction. The emotional and pedagogical shifts led her to negotiate her professional identity as a content specialist. This study suggests that language teacher emotions and identities are ecologically situated and dynamically reconfigured in response to unequal educational environments. It concludes that unequal school ecologies can condition how teachers perceive the value of different forms of professional expertise.

Keywords:

language teacher emotions, teacher identities, Ecological Systems Theory, narrative inquiry, novice English teacher, multilingual classroom

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