Communities of practice: Exploring the diverse use of a theory

The social learning theory of communities of practice is frequently used in mathematics education research. However, we have come to recognise that the theory is used in diverse ways, regarding both the parts that are used and the ways in which those parts are used. This paper presents an overview of this diverse use of the theory based on three themes: Are communities of practice viewed as pre-existing or are they designed within the study? Are individuals or groups foregrounded in the study? Which parts of the theory are mainly used? The aim of the paper is twofold: to make visible the diverse possibilities within one single theory, and to make visible how, even though we might think we know what a theory implies in research, if we look beneath the surface we may find that "the same" theory can imply many different things.