Research
Dr. Chen’s research trajectory reflects a sustained engagement with poststructuralist theory, particularly Foucauldian perspectives on power, knowledge, and subjectivity, as the critical lens through which he approaches language education. His doctoral work at Simon Fraser University examined immigrant subjectivity formation through poststructuralist and postcolonial lenses; this critical orientation now grounds his current research program on language teacher agency, translanguaging, and the ethical integration of generative AI into language and professional education.
His recent publications focus on subjectivity reconstitution, decolonial approaches to language education, and the ethical and critical integration of generative AI in educational contexts, including a growing strand of work that treats teachers themselves as designers and developers of classroom AI tools. His work is characterized by innovative methodological approaches, including narrative inquiry, collaborative ethnography, and mixed-methods designs that combine ethnographic case work with teacher perception data, all consistent with a critical, poststructuralist epistemology.
Research Interests
- Language teacher agency in the age of generative AI
- Translanguaging pedagogies
- Foucauldian and poststructuralist approaches to identity and power in education
- Teachers as developers (not merely consumers) of educational AI
- Critical applied linguistics and decolonial approaches to language education
- Narrative inquiry and collaborative ethnography
Research Funding
I am a team member of the 3M Social Media Analytics project.
Digital Scholarship & Open Science
- GitHub: github.com/dtrmcc
- AI Teaching Assistant: chatbase.co
- AI Nurse Training System (in development): nusring4.netlify.app
For a full list of publications, please visit the Publications page.