This is a reflection on the construction process of nursing professional identity. The main objective was to position the subject in nursing scientific production, identifying some guidelines of interpretation about this identity construction and their determinants, as follows: the knowledge, the profession, the identity perception, the history, the art and ethics, the gender, the identity, the job and the work force. The understandings contained in the article may contribute to the construction of the conceptual reference for studies about Identity. It presents the principle that this identity is essentially constructed through daily work
own identity; nurse