ABSTRACT
The pedagogical options available to teachers are products of a complex series of factors, including the cultural/ideological, economic context within which schools are located. A key interest is the teaching process as it relates to the more general labor process under capitalism. Specifically, there appears to be a strong basis for the argument that the proletarianization of the occupation is occurring. Case studies about two first-year female teachers illustrate these concerns. These teachers were more vulnerable to the specific operating procedures of their schools than prevailing understandings of professional work suggest; hence the argument for a conceptualization of teachers as workers vs. teachers as professionals. Ideological considerations and gender relations are critically important for understanding various influences and constraints on the teaching process. While the ideals of professionalism are shown to bear little relationship to the circumstances of teachers’ practices, as an ideological construct, professionalism informs teacher actions.
