(In)(Out)Sider(s): White Immigrant PhD Students Reflecting on their Teaching Experience

This article focuses on personal accounts of the early experiences of two white immigrant PhD students with teaching responsibility at a Canadian university. The authors use auto-ethnography to reflect on the intersection of ‘whiteness’ and immigrant status and critically examine the teaching and learning dynamics of the university classroom. Using the lens of feminist intersectional theory, we argue that the processes of identity construction (both personal and professional) experienced by white immigrant novice instructors follow the tenets of social construction of immigrants as the ‘Other’ and show that our position as outsiders undermines our ability to actively attend to diversity in the classroom. We conclude by recommending strategies for transformation and enhancement of the dialogue between immigrant instructors and students within a supportive university environment.