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The Interaction of Culture and Context in the Construction of Teachers' Putative Entitled Attitude in the Midst of Change

Understanding Excessive Teacher and Faculty Entitlement

ISBN: 978-1-80043-941-2, eISBN: 978-1-80043-940-5

Publication date: 30 September 2021

Abstract

This chapter investigates the phenomenon of teachers' “entitled attitude” that manifested itself as resistance to change in the midst of a curricular reform in the Indian school context. For teachers long socialized into a teacher-centered culture, the change expected was nothing less than a paradigm shift in the Kuhnian sense. However, conclusions drawn from studies involving cursory surveys and teacher observation pinned the problem to teachers' “entitled attitude,” an unwillingness to exert themselves beyond the minimum level required by school policies. This view reflects a lack of acknowledgement of teachers as persons with values and the capacity to think and feel as potential agents of community practices such as schooling. My study investigates the wider sociocultural historical and political basis of teachers' putative “entitled attitude” informed by Lev Vygotsky's dialectical approach. It accesses the interrelated history of a teacher at a number of levels using the teacher's life history to create the narrative. This “genetic” analysis helps illuminate what the curricular change means to teachers inside out. The findings are used to unravel the nature of support that would help teachers realize their agency and sway them from using entitlement as a compensatory mechanism to deflect change.

Keywords

Citation

Ratnam, T. (2021), "The Interaction of Culture and Context in the Construction of Teachers' Putative Entitled Attitude in the Midst of Change", Ratnam, T. and Craig, C.J. (Ed.) Understanding Excessive Teacher and Faculty Entitlement (Advances in Research on Teaching, Vol. 38), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 77-101. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1479-368720210000038006

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

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