The new field of the history of knowledge is often presented as a mere expansion of the history of science. We argue that it has a greater ambition. The re‐definition of the historiographical domain of the history of knowledge urges us to ask new questions about the boundaries, hierarchies, and mutual constitution of different types of knowledge as well as the role and assessment of failure and ignorance in making knowledge. These issues have pertinence in the current climate where expertise is increasingly questioned and authority seems to lose its ground. Illustrated with examples from recent historiography of the sixteenth to twentieth centuries, we indicate some fruitful new avenues for research in the history of knowledge. Taken together, we hope that they will show that the history of knowledge could build the expertise required by the challenges of twenty‐first century knowledge societies, just like the history of science, throughout its development as a discipline in the twentieth century, responded to the demands posed by science and society.

中文翻译：

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知识的历史和知识社会的未来

知识史的新领域经常被呈现为仅仅是科学史的扩展。我们认为它有更大的野心。知识史的史学领域的重新定义促使我们对不同类型知识的边界、层次和相互构成以及失败和无知在创造知识中的作用和评估提出新的问题。这些问题在当前的环境中具有相关性，在这个环境中，专业知识越来越受到质疑，权威似乎失去了立足之地。我们以 16 至 20 世纪的近期史学为例，指出了一些富有成效的知识史研究新途径。综合起来，