1. Introduction

This chapter discusses how mobile technology has reshaped language learning and teaching, prompting scholars to investigate mobile-assisted language learning (MALL) in L2 contexts. Since COVID-19, Chinese universities have widely adopted online-plus-mobile instruction, confronting teachers with fresh challenges in integrating MALL and redefining their professional selves. Global L2 research now emphasizes emotions and identity, yet work on learners' anxiety, enjoyment, and boredom outweighs attention to teachers' inner lives, which have historically been undervalued. Emotions are framed as motivational forces that unlock learning potential and mediate psychological barriers. Identity is viewed as the enactment of professional roles during practice. Cultural background and prior experience shape these phenomena, so narrative inquiry is selected to trace an individual university teacher's shifting emotions and evolving identity within MALL.

2. Literature Review

This chapter discussed mobile-assisted language learning as a digitally enabled, context-sensitive mode that blends formal and informal activities through smartphones and similar devices, highlighting its portability, scalability, and capacity to situate content within learners' physical surroundings. It traced the evolution from computer-assisted language learning to MALL, noting the shift from stationary human-computer interaction to flexible, anywhere-anytime access that extends beyond classrooms yet remains integrated with traditional instruction. Empirical work in Chinese higher education was reviewed, showing MALL's positive impact on listening, grammar, vocabulary, and overall academic performance when coupled with models such as flipped teaching or smart College English frameworks. Student satisfaction surveys indicated strong approval of mobile methods for preview, consolidation, extracurricular training, and feedback.

The chapter then examined teacher identity and emotion as interwoven phenomena constructed through participation in educational practices rather than fixed attributes. Identity was portrayed as a dynamic, emotionally laden self-understanding that evolves as teachers narrate "big stories" of significant events via interviews, diaries, and reflective accounts. Emotions were presented as multidimensional forces that accompany and shape professional identity transitions, particularly visible in language teaching contexts where teachers negotiate expectations, institutional discourses, and classroom interactions.

Finally, it synthesized these strands by adopting Sociocultural Theory to frame how MALL mediates university English teachers' emotional experiences and identity formation. Mediation and internalization were identified as central processes through which teachers appropriate cultural tools—mobile technologies, institutional norms, peer feedback—transforming external experiences into internal psychological resources laden with affect. Empirical studies illustrated that engagement with MALL triggers emotional responses such as tension, vulnerability, or agency, and these affective states feed back into the ongoing reconstruction of teachers' professional selves. Thus, the chapter argued that MALL is not merely an instructional innovation but a catalyst for emotional and identity work among university English teachers.

3. Methodology

This chapter discussed the methodological design adopted to investigate how a university English teacher's emotional responses and identity evolve within mobile-assisted language learning (MALL). Three interrelated questions guided the inquiry: the ways emotional reactions intersect with shifting professional identities during MALL adoption; the influence exerted by both technological and institutional environments on these emotions and identities; and how the gradual internalization of MALL practices reshapes the teacher's sense of professional self. Narrative inquiry was selected as the overarching approach because it foregrounds storytelling as a means through which individuals reorganize fragmented experiences across time and space, thereby allowing researchers to trace identity construction as an ongoing, socially mediated process. The method situates experiences within a triadic framework of temporality, sociality, and place to capture the multidimensionality of lived experience.

The participant, Jack, is an English teacher at a normal university in central China. Holding bachelor's and two master's degrees in English-related fields, he brought six years of teaching experience, prior IELTS training work, and an explicit enthusiasm for educational reform. His long-standing relationship with the researchers facilitated recruitment and enabled rich, longitudinal engagement.

Data collection was triangulated across three complementary sources. Informal conversations, captured through audio recordings and detailed memos from October 2019 to February 2024, provided spontaneous, context-rich narratives of daily experiences. Semi-structured interviews, each lasting about 90 minutes, probed Jack's cognitive reflections on MALL and identity development while remaining open to emergent themes. Reflective journals, continuously maintained by Jack, documented emotional states, student feedback, classroom incidents, and evolving teaching philosophies, thereby offering insider perspectives on the internalization process.

Data analysis aligned with sociocultural theory and proceeded in two stages. First, repeated readings of all narratives identified segments linked to emotional experience and identity shifts; grounded theory's constant comparative method grouped these segments into inductively derived thematic categories such as resistance, emotional frustration, and agentive engagement. Second, collaborative coding sessions refined these categories through Braun and Clarke's six-step thematic analysis, ensuring alignment with sociocultural constructs. Microgenetic, ontogenetic, and sociocultural lenses were applied to track change within short timeframes, across the lifespan, and within contextual layers, respectively. Cross-referencing interview responses with journal entries further mapped identity trajectories and enhanced interpretive validity.

4. Findings

This chapter described how Jack, a university English teacher, experienced a profound transformation in professional identity and emotional stance toward mobile-assisted language learning (MALL) across six years. The narrative is divided into three developmental stages and is interpreted through sociocultural theory.

Jack began as a conservative novice whose identity was anchored in family heritage and admiration for meticulous blackboard writing. Raised by teacher-grandparents, he internalized a craft model of instruction that equated fine chalk calligraphy with professional excellence. His Polish M.A. studies reinforced this bias; the absence of MALL tools in European classrooms normalized chalk-and-talk pedagogy for him. Between 2016 and 2018, while teaching IELTS, he acknowledged the existence of vocabulary apps yet deliberately chose in-class dictation over digital convenience. Even when his university pushed contestants in teaching competitions to showcase mobile platforms, Jack privileged handwritten lesson plans and blackboard logic, believing that knowledge transmission rested on teacher clarity rather than device novelty.

The COVID-19 outbreak in 2020 abruptly relocated instruction to online spaces and forced Jack into the role of a natural user. Confronted with the Superstar Learning Platform and zero technical preparation, he initially felt disoriented. Informal chats reveal students reassuring him while he struggled to record lectures. Institutional pressure intensified: every faculty member had to build an online course within days, yet senior colleagues—most over fifty—lacked digital literacy. Jack, as the youngest member of the teaching group, shouldered the collective burden; he troubleshooted glitches, filmed 80 hours of content, and uploaded materials daily. Within two months his course exceeded 100,000 views, an unexpected metric that converted anxiety into curiosity. The university's centralized portal allowed real-time monitoring of attendance, exercise completion, and material access; such transparent analytics supplied immediate feedback loops absent in traditional classrooms. Exposure to these affordances began eroding his resistance.

By the time campuses reopened, Jack had become an enthusiastic adopter who blended offline and online modes deliberately. He continued using mobile apps to track attendance, distributed randomized quizzes by shaking his phone, and posted after-class discussion threads that drew reticent students into dialogue. His course ultimately accumulated over one million clicks and was nominated for the institutional "First-Class Course Project," a three-year grant that obliges continuous optimization of digital resources for student preview and review. Jack now frames MALL not as a threat to tradition but as an amplifier of it: chalk-based clarity remains valuable, yet mobile analytics and asynchronous forums extend the temporal and social boundaries of learning. Data mining of his interview transcripts, reflective journals, and informal conversations identified nine recurring lexical clusters—traditional teaching, mobile devices, teaching assessment, digital classroom, engaging learning environment—that trace the discursive shift from skepticism to advocacy.

The internalization process is theorized as a movement along a continuum of resistance, reluctant use, strategic appropriation, and identity expansion. Initially, MALL artifacts (apps, dashboards, clickstream data) existed as external tools Jack distrusted; through pandemic-mediated praxis these tools became internal mediational means that redefined his conception of "effective teaching." Emotionally, early apprehension and embarrassment mutated into pride and professional confidence as external recognition (student engagement metrics, peer requests for resources, institutional awards) validated the new practices. Consequently, Jack's teacher identity evolved from a guardian of chalk-and-talk orthodoxy to a designer of hybrid learning ecologies who orchestrates both embodied classroom presence and asynchronous mobile interaction.

5. Discussion

This chapter discussed how a university English teacher's emotional journey in mobile-assisted language learning reshaped his professional identity through three stages: conservative novice, natural user, and enthusiastic adopter. Anxiety and resistance dominated the novice phase as limited digital familiarity collided with traditional training, producing cautious, pragmatic acceptance enforced by pandemic-driven online teaching. In the natural-user phase, repeated positive classroom outcomes triggered curiosity and motivation, while reflective journal entries revealed ongoing tension between traditional instructor and technology-integrated facilitator roles, demonstrating cognition and emotion as intertwined. By the enthusiastic-adopter phase, emotions shifted toward confidence and ownership; Jack not only innovated with tools but also engaged in critical evaluation and reflective practice, fully internalizing MALL as part of his educator identity.

Professional context was pivotal. Prior face-to-face training offered scant digital preparation, whereas institutional mandates such as online evaluations and smart-classroom upgrades created unavoidable pressure. Yet peer mentoring and professional competitiveness provided scaffolding, illustrating that teacher emotions are embedded in sociocultural and institutional environments. Knowledge internalization followed a parallel three-step arc: initial detached awareness, deeper learning through trial classes and guided reflection, and ultimately reflective evaluation coupled with affective ownership. Emotional alignment with MALL, not mere technical mastery, drove identity transformation from reluctant user to innovative educator.

The findings indicate that teacher identity development is a dynamic interplay of emotion, context, and knowledge acquisition. Effective technology integration therefore requires professional development that integrates reflective practice, peer support, and emotionally safe spaces, enabling teachers to sustain pedagogical innovation and adaptive teaching practices.

6. Conclusion

This chapter discussed how a university English teacher's emotional journey and identity shift within MALL unfolded as a dynamic, socially mediated process. Initial anxiety and resistance were traced to entrenched traditional training and limited digital expertise; positive student responses and enhanced efficiency gradually transformed these feelings into curiosity and enthusiasm, concurrently renegotiating his identity from conventional instructor to confident technology-integrated educator. Institutional mandates, peer modeling, and evaluative pressures served both as scaffold and stressor, illustrating that emotions and professional identity are co-constructed within sociocultural settings. Internalization of MALL knowledge advanced through three reflective stages—connecting, deepening, and critically evaluating—culminating in emotional ownership and innovative pedagogy. The findings stress that effective technology adoption hinges on parallel cultivation of technical skills, emotional support, and identity work; professional development should therefore blend reflective practice, mentoring, and affective scaffolding. Institutional policies must embed comprehensive MALL literacy covering ethics and balanced pedagogy. Single-participant design limits generalizability, suggesting the need for broader, context-diverse studies.