Duality (CoPs)

In the theory of community of practice, an interdisciplinary field between sociology of education and educational psychology, the notion of a duality is used to capture the idea of the tension between two opposing forces which become a driving force for change and creativity. Wenger uses the concept of dualities to examine the forces that create and sustain a community of practice. He describes a duality as "a single conceptual unit that is formed by two inseparable and mutually constitutive elements whose inherent tensions and complementarity give the concept richness and dynamism" . Some compare the concept of a duality to that of yin and yang, i.e. two mutually defining opposites. The opposing entities in a duality need to be viewed from a perspective of balance rather than opposition. The term implies a dynamism, continual change and mutual adjustment as the tensions that are inherent in dualities can be both creative and constraining. identifies four dualities that exist in communities of practice: participation–reification, designed–emergent, identification–negotiability and local–global. The participation–reification duality is concerned with meaning. Meaning is created through participation and active involvement in some practice. Reification is a way of making an abstract and concise representation of what is often a complex and frequently messy practice, thus making it easier to share within the community. Because of its obvious links to knowledge management, the participation-reification duality has been the focus of particular interest in this field . The designed–emergent duality focuses on time and captures the tension between pre-planned and emergent activities. Designers can plan an activity that is designed to achieve a particular purpose however, some activities emerge through interaction and participation of the community; these are unplanned and may be contrary to what the designers intended. These give participants the opportunity to (re)negotiate existing meaning.