6th International Congress of Ethnomathematics (ICEM-6)

1. Ethnomathematics in school contexts

This theme refers to how social and cultural knowledge(s) are called into question within school contexts, realizing that school and non-school environments have different nature and function. This questioning is fundamental to allow an education with cultural relevance. Works looking for an understanding of the knowledge to teach and the knowledge to learn in a school system driven by cultural diversity will be considered for this thematic area.

2. Ethnomathematics and its epistemologies

The epistemological foundation of ethnomathematical research has been a source of reflections and debates on the forms of production, validation and legitimization of knowledge. These debates are evident in the range of theoretical and methodological explorations that are present in Ethnomathematics. For this topic will be considered proposals that unfold spaces of joint inquiry about the legacy, present and future of Ethnomathematics (in its social and academic developments). Although these discussions are sometimes approached from classical notions of epistemology, we encourage authors to postulate contributions that explore alternative epistemologies.

3. Ethnomathematics and languages

Linguistic practices are intertwined with cultural and epistemological diversity, and they have made evident the rooted and situated nature of the knowledge that Ethnomathematics investigates. Oral, written, visual and any other kind of languages give an account of the elements through which humans produce their ways to give meaning of the world. In this area, we will consider works that explore linguistic practices within the production, transformation and dissemination of knowledge.

4. Ethnomathematics and its political nature

Ethnomathematics has been interested in the relations of power that are established through knowledge, and therefore the field has been inquiring the processes in which a knowledge become legitimized or not. In this way, ethnomathematics seeks to contribute to the consolidation of peace (individual, social, environmental and military). This thematic area will consider works that describe and analyze processes of recognition among different ways of being, living, knowing and understanding the world. We invite authors to present proposals that contribute to the transformation of social imaginaries as well as institutional and political structures. Projects of ethnomathematics working on forms of reparation, healing and reconciliation to build societies based on coexistence will be very welcomed.

5. Ethnomathematics beyond the school context.

Ethnomathematics tries to understand individual, communitarian and societal ways of being and doing. These ways are dialectically constituted by the needs of survival and transcendence, and can be understood trough the relations of the subject with nature and with society. This thematic area comprises works and projects establishing relationships of ethnomathematics with other fields of knowledge, practices and social organizations.

6. Ethnomathematics and teacher education.

Preservice and in-service mathematics teacher education are usually centered on the study of conceptual, didactic, pedagogical and methodological aspects. However, these aspects should not be detached from reflections of social, cultural and political order, among others. Ethnomathematics contributes to the incorporation of these reflections to initiatives of teacher education. In this area, we look for works that discuss processes of teacher education based on an ethnomathematical approach.