Legitimate peripheral participation (LPP) describes how newcomers become experienced members and eventually old timers of a

community of practice A community of practice (CoP) is a group of people who "share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly". The concept was first proposed by cognitive anthropologist Jean Lave and educat ...

or collaborative project . LPP identifies learning as a contextual

social phenomenon Social phenomena or social phenomenon (singular) are any behaviours, actions, or events that takes place because of social influence, including from contemporary as well as historical societal influences. They are often a result of multifaceted p ...

, achieved through participation in a community practice. According to LPP, newcomers become members of a

community A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place, norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, t ...

initially by participating in simple and low-risk tasks that are nonetheless productive and necessary and further the goals of the community. Through peripheral activities, novices become acquainted with the tasks, vocabulary, and organizing principles of the community's practitioners. Gradually, as newcomers become old timers and gain a recognized level of mastery, their participation takes forms that are more and more central to the functioning of the community. LPP suggests that membership in a community of practice is mediated by the possible forms of participation to which newcomers have access, both physically and socially. In the case of a mentor-mentee relationship between older timers and newcomers, the old timer has both the power to confer legitimacy to the newcomer, and to control the newcomer's level of access to different community practices and experiences. If newcomers can directly observe the practices of

expert An expert is somebody who has a broad and deep understanding and competence in terms of knowledge, skill and experience through practice and education in a particular field. Informally, an expert is someone widely recognized as a reliable so ...

s, they understand the broader context into which their own efforts fit. Conversely LPP suggests that newcomers who are separated from the experts have limited access to their tools and community and therefore have limited growth. As participation increases, situations arise that allow the participant to assess how well they are contributing through their efforts, thus legitimate peripheral participation provides a means for self-evaluation . LPP is not reserved for descriptions of membership in formal organizations or professions whose practices are highly defined. For example
O'Donovan and Kirk
suggest that young people's participation in sport can be compared to a Community of Practice related to physical education. In his later work on communities of practice, Wenger abandoned the concept of legitimate peripheral participation and introduced the idea of a duality instead; however, the term is still widely used in relation to

situated learning Situated learning is a theory that explains an individual's acquisition of professional skills and includes research on apprenticeship into how legitimate peripheral participation leads to membership in a community of practice. Situated learning " ...

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Further reading