An Introduction to the Handbook, Communities of Practice, and Definitions of Expertise

This chapter provides a brief summary of the various communities of practice that have paved the way for current expertise researchers, and are formative of this Handbook. A synopsis follows, detailing how expertise has been defined both historically and in present day. The purpose in this chapter is threefold: To demonstrate the heterogeneity of approaches and conceptions of expertise, to contextualize current views of expertise presented in this Handbook, and to use these views as a springboard to examine how we should examine expertise in the future—which is addressed in the final chapter. Finally, an outline of this Handbook’s chapters are presented.