Teacher candidates’ narratives as imagined professional identity work: adopting funds of identity

Purpose Imagined professional identity plays a pivotal role in identity development since it helps set long-term goals and serves as a motivational source, especially for a teacher candidate (TC). Adopting the theoretical framework of funds of identity, this study aims to explore the role of narratives authored by English as a foreign language TC in developing their imagined professional identity, a gap which has yet to be explored. Design/methodology/approach To address this gap, the interactionally oriented narratives and unstructured interviews of 25 TCs were collected and conducted. Findings The findings revealed that through activating funds of identity, narratives were found to have a constructive role in developing TCs’ imagined identity through preparing a context where they reflected on and negotiated about pedagogical issues of interest, re-organized materials, developed self-awareness and diagnosed the teaching/learning problems. Therefore, narratives provided foresight for the future, through which TCs can visualize their imagined future professionalism. They started to link between theory and practice by making new meanings as well as learning and constructing knowledge as active agents of their narrative production. Research limitations/implications This study draws implications and suggests areas of further research to address the gap in the existing related literature. Originality/value This study highlights how narratives can be used in L2 teacher education programs to activate aspects of TCs’ imagined identities.