Different teacher orientations regarding migration-related diversity and how their own sense of recognition plays a crucial role

Abstract

This research sheds light on the different basic orientations that teachers have regarding migration-related diversity and the ways in which these orientations are shaped by life stories and social contexts. “Basic orientation” refers to what Bohnsack calls an “orientation framework” in terms of the incorporated patterns of thought and action that build the modus operandi of an individual, which is continuously constituted through the interplay of individual and collective spaces of experience. The research is pursued with the qualitative-hermeneutic approach of the “documentary method” and with data generation through biographic-narrative interviews. The sample comprises 38 primary school teachers in German-speaking Switzerland. The analyses identify a typology with five type structures. Examining them with a structure approach from professionalisation theory, they can be interpreted as more or less professionalised – one of the hinges being the question of whether the teachers are able to decentralise perspectives and include the experience of not-knowing instead of stereotyping others. Another hinge is the question of how teachers experience their own recognition, which is reflected against the theory of recognition.

Keywords

• Teacher professionalisation
• migration-related diversity
• recognition
• qualitative-hermeneutic
• documentary method