(RE)SEARCHING LANGUAGE EDUCATION PROFESSIONAL ETHICS AND MYSELF: TAKING A REFLEXIVE ROUTE

Researching is unquestionably a social practice like any other, an understanding that is shared with applied linguists from different subfields. Nonetheless, what I believe does not seem to be common sense is that to research a particular topic, researchers shall reveal a significant amount of who they are, what they believe in, and what their hopes and fears are. This piece aims to share my own reflexive exercise regarding my doctoral study, selected based on my professional interest, which was a qualitative research grounded in the Applied Linguistics field and focused on professional ethics of Brazilian language teachers enrolled in undergraduate programs in the state of Paraná. In order to exemplify how reflexivity (Consoli; Ganassin, 2023) has been enacted in this doctoral study, a participant’s story is recalled and reflected upon. In sum, the impacts that the research we carry out have on us, researchers, are not strictly professional; they genuinely (trans)form — i.e., transform and form — who we are and who we are becoming as human beings.