Investigating Entanglements in Experienced Language Teachers’ Sense of Belonging and What Belonging Does

The vast body of research on language teacher identity from the past two decades along with more recent research on language teacher emotions have shown that identity and emotions are mutually shaping facets of language teachers’ professional lives (Wolff & De Costa, 2017). (Un)belonging is a key link between teacher identity and emotions in that the feeling of belonging typically corresponds to insider identities and unbelonging with peripheral or outsider status. However, we still know relatively little about how the feeling of (un)belonging is experienced by language teachers, particularly veteran teachers. Given that belonging can deepen teachers’ ongoing commitment to their students and enhance their overall wellbeing, it is important to have a theoretically informed understanding of (un)belonging and to examine how veteran teachers perceive and experience it and what it moves them to do. This study focuses on accounts of (un)belonging that emerged unsolicited in semi-structured qualitative interviews with twenty-four experienced language teachers working in Germany and Norway. Thematic analysis of the interviews revealed that (un)belonging is entangled in teachers’ decisions to become language teachers, relationships with colleagues and students, perceptions of their professional efficacy, and attachments to school communities. The article also explores what (un)belonging does.