Although it has revealed the material conditions under which language education programmes are implemented worldwide, research on neoliberalism and language commodification has not yet adequately centred pedagogy. Thus, processes commodifying 'objects' other than language as product go unnoticed in educational settings. Drawing on a four-year ethnography in Hong Kong, this article details the processes whereby social actors formulated pedagogy as a 'commodity register' to create distinction, index normative roles and desirable social personae. It also shows how some actors concurrently constructed pedagogy as a resource for advancing ethnic-group activist concerns, leading to unpredicted tensions and forms of inequality.