Race, Sexual Orientation, Culture and Male Teacher Role Models: “Will Any Teacher Do as Long as They are Good?”

Abstract

There is a perceived shortage of males in education provincially and nationally in Canada, particularly at the elementary level. My theoretical framework derives from queer theory, questioning the fluidity of discourse and identities, and troubling accepted, commonplace beliefs, knowledge, and practices. To this end, I interpret data from an online survey of 223 male primary/junior schoolteachers in Ontario. In this paper, I address male primary-junior teachers as role models in relation to race, sexual orientation, and culture, regarding two popular ideologies. The first is that of good teachers who can supposedly teach all pupils regardless of their own identity markers and sense of agency, or those of their pupils and larger communities. The second reflects notions of diversity to offset hegemonic male gender expectations, and to better reflect diversity in the broader school and social populations, while counterbalancing the overwhelming numbers of female role models in school, and at home, for children.

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