In this article the authors address the question: 'What sub-identities of teacher educators emerge from the research literature about teacher educators and what are the implications of the sub-identities for the professional development of teacher educators?' To answer the research question, the authors set out to analyze the research literature relating to teacher educators to search for ways in which such sub-identities might be explicitly or implicitly described. Based on the research literature the authors found four sub-identities that are available for teacher educators: schoolteacher, teacher in Higher Education, teacher of teachers (or second order teacher) and researcher.