The roles and positioning of non-English speaking background overseas-trained teachers in the Australian public school system

University of Technology Sydney. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.This thesis focuses on bilingual/plurilingual school teachers who are working in the Australian education field. The research investigates the ways in which these teachers are differentially denied or allowed access to the Australian education field, and ways in which these teachers, rich in plurilingual and pluricultural experience, are legitimated once they are employed in the public school system. Bourdieu’s key concepts of fields of power, capital and habitus provide the primary analytical lens for this research; Fairclough’s critical discourse analysis is a complementary tool for an investigation into how the teachers are positioned in the field. This qualitative research draws on analyses of institutional documents pertaining to Australian education as well as case study interviews with teachers. Much has been documented concerning the challenges and hurdles facing non-English-speaking-background (NESB) overseas-trained teachers in Australian schools. This research explores where these teachers are located in the field; the habitus of these teachers; the strategies these teachers have demonstrated to accumulate capital, and; how, or indeed whether, these strategies have changed the logic of practice in the field. The study investigates various forms of cultural capital, for example, language awareness and ability, and cultural awareness or understanding, and how these are accumulated and valued in the field. The research maps the linguistic markets within the schools and across communities. The study found that the hegemonic practices of the field, such as the use of English as the solely legitimated language and the ways in which languages other than English are subjugated, are successful in maintaining their dominance over the field and thus delegitimate dominated languages and cultures in the field. The study’s findings and analysis illuminate the impediments facing bilingual/plurilingual teachers in Australia. The thesis provides great insight into the teachers’ dispositions and how their habitus continually shapes and is shaped by the field; it shows how the power relations in the field are established through the interpretations made by dominant agents in the sites of practice. The research uncovers how the logic of practice and doxa of the field are open to interpretations due to the unclear and at times contradictory messages around language practices at the policy/political level. Ultimately, the thesis also shows the ways in which the IEs themselves uphold the hegemonic practices of the field through their misrecognition of the logic of practice of the field