Teacher professional identity is a comprehensive reflection of teachers’ role perception, emotional experiences, and behavioral tendencies towards their profession. It serves as an intrinsic driving force for teachers’ professional development and is also a crucial issue in teacher education research. From a global perspective, this study systematically reviews and examines relevant research on the professional identity of international Chinese language teachers (ICLTs). A comparative analysis is conducted between Chinese and foreign scholars’ research in terms of theoretical foundations, research subjects, research content, and research methodologies. This comprehensive overview of the current research landscape in this field, along with a summary of existing achievements and identified problems, facilitates the transformation of fragmented research findings on ICLTs’ professional identity into a systematic understanding and reveals research gaps. Building upon this foundation, the study proposes future research prospects for the professional identity of ICLTs from aspects such as the construction of a cross-cultural perspective-based teacher professional identity system, the transformation of teacher professional identity in the context of digital transformation, and case studies on ICLTs’ professional identity. The aim is to promote high-quality development in both theory and practice of international Chinese language education.
Liqiang Xu (Thu,) studied this question.