ABSTRACT
Expertise has one obvious connection with the literacy practices of the academy as we have observed them over the last few chapters: It forms the basis of the striking difference between the practices of the experts, at least as exemplified by the scientific professions, and the practices of novices, as exemplified by students in school. This difference, as we have seen, has been surprising to both researchers and teachers who, for the most part, have expected to find academic literacy practices arrayed along a developmental continuum with professional practices at one end and student practices spread out across the other. The evidence we have encountered so far, however, suggests that these two sets of practices are substantially different in character. In particular, the literacy practices of experts in the academy are organized around the creation and transformation of academic knowledge; the literacy practices of novices, on the other hand, are organized around the getting and displaying of that knowledge.
