The dysbeing and wellbeing of secondary English teachers in England

: a co-creative, poetic inquiry

Abstract

The research presented in this thesis is the result of a co-creative, poetic inquiry into the dysbeing and wellbeing of secondary English teachers in England that was conducted between 2018 and 2020. The project was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). The study’s aim was to explore English teachers’ conceptualisations of teacher wellbeing in order to better understand their authentic wellbeing needs. This aim was born out of a recognition that, despite several decades of research into teachers’ high levels of stress and low levels of workplace wellbeing, many teachers in England continue to struggle. The project was also inspired, in part, by my own experiences of teaching English in state institutions in England between 2003 and 2015.
The project takes a critical stance insofar as it overtly supports an emancipatory model of education and eschews a neoliberal doctrine of marketisation, standardisation and competition, in education and more broadly. It challenges both a wellbeing agenda that promotes normative ideas of a perfect self, and an educational movement that seeks to reify human beings in alignment with market values. To this end, the project has sought to approach the topic of teacher dysbeing and wellbeing in such a way that the complexity and nuance of teachers’ lives is recognised.
A methodology of poetic inquiry was adopted, underpinned by a relational ontology and a co-creative epistemology. Qualitative ‘data’ was created with over 25 co-participants, predominantly secondary English teachers working in state institutions. A combination, of creative-writing workshops with groups and exploratory conversations with individuals, yielded more than 90 individual and co-written poems and vignettes. These pieces were then compiled into a collection entitled Enamoured with Words, which accompanies this thesis. The collection was analysed using a combination of literary and sociological methods. A conceptual framework, grounded in relational and democratic ideas of education and wellbeing, was developed from the literature reviews by way of providing a lens for this analysis.
The findings from this project suggest that English teachers conceptualise wellbeing variously, often critically, and often in ways that go beyond behavioural or individualised understandings espoused by academic and professional literature. English teachers’ authentic wellbeing needs can be said, from this exploration, to inhere in practices wherein the non-negotiable legitimacy of personhood is foregrounded, diversity is meaningfully celebrated, and authentic expression of self is possible. The study has also shown that English teachers’ authentic wellbeing needs are intimately connected with the nature of subject English and with its potential for the cultivation of relational and experiential learning. The project contributes to knowledge on art-based methodologies in education, by demonstrating the potential for poetic inquiry to surface contextual and situated understandings of teacher wellbeing, through increased multivocality and the deliberate de-literalisation of this complex concept.

Date of Award	3 Oct 2023
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	University of Bristol
Sponsors	Economic and Social Research Council
Supervisor	Angeline M Barrett (Supervisor) & Helen Manchester (Supervisor)