Teachers' Beliefs in promoting Gender Awareness using Fiction

Sammanfattning: Every generation views the world through different lenses, and teachers must continuously expand their horizons to accommodate paradigm shifts. To better align with the current concept of gender, Skolverket is updating the curriculum as of July 1st, 2022, and proposes that all language teaching is well suited for this purpose. According to previous research on how to best teach sensitive subjects, particularly gender awareness, fiction is highly recommended. The present study sets out to explore teacher beliefs regarding teaching gender awareness through fiction in the EFL classroom in Sweden. Moreover, it investigates how teachers' beliefs affect the selection of fiction to address gender awareness. Semi-structured interviews with five upper secondary English teachers with various experiences were conducted. Contrary to previous research, the results do not reveal differences based on the participants' teaching experience. The results show that the participants acknowledged that gender awareness was to be implemented in teaching according to the curriculum. However, they differed in their interpretation of how and if this should be applied in EFL teaching. Furthermore, some participants stated that their implementation of gender awareness depended on their view of the classroom environment. In addition, results show a difference between participants' beliefs on addressing gender awareness and how this affects their selection of fiction. Keywords: gender, teaching, fiction, upper secondary, teacher beliefs, ESL, EFL