Vietnamese Generation-Z Teachers’ Professional Identity Development: A Positioning-Theoretical Collaborative Trio-Narrative Inquiry

In the context of rapid educational transformation and increasing demands in English language teaching, teacher professional identity has become central to how teachers interpret experiences and sustain professional engagement. However, limited research has examined how such identities are co-constructed through the collaborative narratives. Addressing this gap, this study explores how Vietnamese Generation-Z English-as-a-Foreign-Language teachers construct and negotiate their professional identities through collaborative narrative interactions. Grounded in a post-structuralist perspective and informed by Positioning Theory, the study conceptualizes teacher identity as discursively produced and contextually negotiated through storytelling. Employing a collaborative trio-narrative inquiry design, data were generated through individual narrative interviews, group narrative conversations, and reflective journals with these three teachers. A theme-based narrative analysis, guided by Clandinin and Connelly’s three-dimensional framework and Positioning Theory, was systematically conducted. Findings revealed that participants’ identities developed through reflexive interpretations of past experiences, interactive negotiations in present teaching practices, and future-oriented projections of their possible selves. These identity (re)constructions were further embedded within a moral order characterized by personal affection, responsibility, and professional commitment. The study itself contributes to teacher identity research by foregrounding collaborative meaning-making and processes of self- and other-positioning. Pedagogical implications are offered for teacher education and continuing professional development, alongside acknowledged limitations and directions for future research.