WORKPLACE LEARNING COMMUNITIES; HORIZONTAL AND VERTICAL? Keywords: communities of practice, horizontal communities, vertical communities, hospital, learning in practice

This empirical study of opportunities for learning in a hospital contributes to the discussion of learning at work and particularly the notion of workplace learning as a horizontal community. Horizontal communities, although focused as such in existing literature, are found to be scarce in this study due to division of labor and physical layout. The horizontal communities seldom reach the in situ domain, and contrary to what is proclaimed in the normative literature, the horizontal interaction seems to be further afar from the task performance itself than what is labeled here as vertical communities appear to be. 1 Etty R. Nilsen, Buskerud University College, Postboks 235, 3603 Kongsberg, Norway. Telephone: +47 97021325, Fax: +47 32 11 71 10, [email protected]