Becoming Professional: Exploring Identity Construction of Non-native CFL Teachers

Abstract

Despite the increasing attention to language teachers’ professional identity over the past decade, there remains unfortunately few studies of non-native teachers of Chinese as a foreign language (CFL). This chapter presents the case of identity construction of two beginning non-native CFL teachers from a university in Denmark. We adopted narrative inquiry to understand the process of self-identification of the two non-native CFL teachers. Interview data examining their Chinese learning experience, the adjustment to teaching roles, and their professional reflections on interculturality were collected and analysed. Findings highlights the complexity of the learning trajectory of turning from CFL learners to CFL teachers, which was viewed by participants as an extension of their original cultural repertoire or sense of professional identity construction. Furthermore, it also found that non-native CFL teachers in this study acknowledge the importance of the interculturality that they have developed in learning and teaching in both Denmark and China. Finally, the chapter offers suggestions for reconsidering CFL teacher education, in an effort to foster non-native Chinese-speaking teachers’ becoming CFL teachers.