ABSTRACT
As a nonnative speaker (NNS from here on) teacher in the ELT field, one can face many frustrations and challenges. For instance, Thomas (1999) identified at least four types of challenges regarding NNS teachers’ professional credibilitydiscrimination in the hiring process, invisibility in the professional community, student suspicion of NNS teachers’ capability, and lack of self-confidence. These challenges are often disempowering, destroying an NNS teacher’s self-confidence, self-efficacy, and even self-worth. Further, as these challenges often deprive NNS teachers of a sense of adequacy, they also deplete NNS teachers of courage to make endeavors to pursue personal and professional growth. As an NNS teacher, I have encountered many of the challenges mentioned above. In seeking a new identity as an NSS teacher, I came to realize that it takes more than professionalism to teach-it takes courage to teach. Professionalism requires recognition by others, and yet courage does not. It requires conviction. In this chapter, therefore, I will first recount my professional development as an NNS English teacher, and then raise a question for further reflection-what defines a teacher who happens to be an NNS? A review of recent and current literature on NNS teachers’ professional development will follow, with an argument that the development of an NNS teacher’s professional strengths alone, without a clearly defined sense of direction or conviction, cannot sustain the growth as a language educator, nor does it offer the courage to teach in the face of various challenges against pedagogical credibility. As I further reflect upon my own personal growth as an NNS teacher, I will describe how my religious faith helped reshape my self-perceptions as a language teacher and renew my sense of purpose and direction as an NNS teacher. In particular, I will describe how it has served as an important source of professional strength, a source of reconciliation, and a source of courage for me to teach. Based on these critical reflections, I will argue at the end of this chapter that faith is a relevant and valid construct in ELT; it is not merely a source that sustains one’s professional growth as a language educator, it is a source of courage to teach.
