5 - Voices of Graduate School Students

Summary

I commence this chapter by introducing the narratives of four graduate school student participants who partook in this endeavor. The participants’ narratives are a representation of the interview data that were relayed to me. They function as the initial phase of data analysis as well as serve as part of the findings because they are presented largely intact as concise stories which are both the basis for analysis and the vehicles for portraying the interview data pithily. The analysis involved subjecting these narratives to constructing grounded theory methods in which I sorted, synthesized, integrated, and formulated a number of prominent and recurrent codes in order to determine several categories and eventually a conceptual framework (theory). I introduce in this chapter primary categories concerning linguistic, cultural, and academic native-speakerism, in addition to Global Englishes, intercultural competence, and professionalism (including work ethics) related to trans-speakerism. I explore and illustrate these by referring to germane excerpts and anecdotes from the interview data to support and expound on the categorizations. This chapter ends with a conceptual framework (theory) and recommendations for practice.