Using the perspective of emotional geographies, this study explored the emotional distances and their relations between the principal and the staffs in "the Rising Sun Elementary School". The participatory observations and interviews were adopted in this study. The researchers analyzed the interactive process among 12 members of the school on six critical events and focused on the principal as a center in the school. The main findings were as follows: First, the major categories and their relations among the principal and school members were moral distances, personal distances, political distances, and professional distances, and the least shown relations were sociocultural and physical distances. Second, between the principal and the staffs, the relations of moral and professional distances were developed easily on the teaching affairs. The administrative matters were easy to help creating the personal, moral, and political distances. Third, the close moral distances were shown between the principal and division directors; on the contrary, the principal and the teachers appeared to have relatively close professional and personal distances. Forth, the main connotations of moral distance included the questions of distributive responsibility, building up the operative principles, keeping on the one's own stance, and developing mutual consensus through constant dialogues. Fifth, the influential factors of personal distance were taking care of members' needs, ignoring the workload, adopting the friendly actions, and demonstrating a sense of humor. Sixth, flexible actions, careful power exercises, and respective teaching practice and attitude constituted the operative principles of political distance. Seventh, valuing teachers' professional autonomy, the principal's assistances and members' participation, supplying a dialogue room could shorten the professional distances among the principal and school members. Finally, the relations of the various emotional distances among the principal and school members in this school were shown a slightly interdependent nature.
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Ming-Dih Lin, Chin-Tu Liang (2014). A Study on Staffs' Emotional Geographies in an Elementary School: Focusing on the Principal. Contemporary Educational Research Quarterly, 22(4), 55-103.
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