Exploring the impact of sexual harassment on teacher identity: An autoethnography

Abstract

This research examines the impact of sexual harassment on teacher identity and, in so doing, opens up conversations around gendered harassment in institutional settings. Drawing from my own experiences, I use autoethnography to lift the curtain on the unacknowledged, misunderstood and often overlooked. Autoethnography moves beyond traditional methods of inquiry to wholly embrace the subjective position of the researcher (Chang, 2008). In this way it is able to offer insights into the ways that identity, power, and culture interrelate in institutional settings. In documenting and then critically reflecting on my personal and professional challenges of being an experienced white female teacher newly employed at an Independent Australian School in a large capital city, I shed light on the gendered nature of workplace harassment from a position that is often silenced. In intertwining my first-hand experiences with the literature, I weave between feelings of powerlessness, critical reflexivity, and scholarly reflection to explore the construction of institutionalised norms and examine how language, subjectivity, and power-relations impact on gender. This research builds on existing knowledge by offering an alternative perspective – that of the researcher’s – to deepen understandings of the social complexities and challenges many women face in institutional workplaces.