Identity Work, Racialized Emotions, and Equity in Mathematics Education

Author:
Luz Valoyes-Chávez Universidad Católica de Temuco and Universidad de Chile

Search for other papers by Luz Valoyes-Chávez in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed Close
and
Lisa Darragh University of Auckland, New Zealand

Search for other papers by Lisa Darragh in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed Close
Volume/Issue:
Volume 53: Issue 5
Page(s):
372–378
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5951/jresematheduc-2022-0002
Restricted access
NCTM members GET ACCESS here
Keywords:
Identity work; Racialized emotions; Equity

This Research Commentary draws on the articles in the March 2022 issue of JRME, engaging with the notion of labor as a key concept to push the field toward novel understandings of equity in mathematics education. We introduce the concepts of identity work and racialized emotions to provide an alternative reading of the articles in that issue, arguing that attention to the interplay of these two concepts is vital to consider issues of equity because mathematics identity intersects with race, gender, class, and sexuality, among other social identities historically marginalized in the classroom. We argue that a focus on such interplay could help to revitalize the discourse on equity in mathematics education across the globe.

  • Collapse
  • Expand
Journal for Research in Mathematics Education
Cover Journal for Research in Mathematics Education

  • Alshwaikh, J., & Straehler-Pohl, H. (2017). Interrupting passivity: Attempts to interrogate political agency in Palestinian school mathematics. In H. Straehler-Pohl, N. Bohlmann, & A. Pais (Eds.), The disorder of mathematics education: Challenging the sociopolitical dimensions of research (pp. 191–208). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-34006-7_12

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Battey, D., Amman, K., Leyva, L. A., Hyland, N., & Wolf McMichael, E. (2022). Racialized and gendered labor in students’ responses to precalculus and calculus instruction. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 53(2), 94–113. https://doi.org/10.5951/jresematheduc-2020-0170

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Boler, M. (1999). Feeling power: Emotions and education. Routledge.

  • Bonilla-Silva, E. (2019). Feeling race: Theorizing the racial economy of emotions. American Sociological Review, 84(1), 1–25. https://doi.org/10.1177/0003122418816958

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Brantlinger, A. (2022). Critical and vocational mathematics: Authentic problems for students from historically marginalized groups. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 53(2), 154–172. https://doi.org/10.5951/jresematheduc-2019-0025

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Charry, Ó., Tamayo, C., & Jaramillo, D. (2020). ¿Matemáticas para todos? Deconstrucciones desde un territorio chocoano [Mathematics for all? Deconstructions from a Chocoano territory]. Revista Latinoamericana de Etnomatemática, 13(4), 95–119. https://doi.org/10.22267/relatem.20134.74

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Cherry, M. (2021). The case for rage: Why anger is essential to anti-racist struggle. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780197557341.001.0001

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Chronaki, A. (2011). “Troubling” essentialist identities: Performative mathematics and the politics of possibility. In M. Kontopodis, C. Wulf, & B. Fichtner (Eds.), Children, development and education: Cultural, historical, anthropological perspectives (pp. 207–226). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0243-1_13

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Chronaki, A. (2013). Identity work as a political space for change: The case of mathematics teaching through technology use. In M. Berger, K. Brodie, V. Frith, & K. le Roux (Eds.), Proceedings of the seventh International Mathematics Education and Society Conference (Vol. 1, pp. 1–18). MES 7.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Chronaki, A., & Kollosche, D. (2019). Refusing mathematics: A discourse theory approach on the politics of identity work. ZDM, 51(3), 457–468. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11858-019-01028-w

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Crespo, S., Herbst, P., Lichtenstein, E. K., Matthews, P. G., & Chazan, D. (2022). Challenges to and opportunities for sustaining an equity focus in mathematics education research. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 53(2), 88–93. https://doi.org/10.5951/jresematheduc-2021-0215

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • D’Ambrosio, B., Frankenstein, M., Gutiérrez, R., Kastberg, S., Martin, D. B., Moschkovich, J., Taylor, E., & Barnes, D. (2013). Positioning oneself in mathematics education research. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 44(1), 11–22. https://doi.org/10.5951/jresematheduc.44.1.0011

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Darragh, L. (2016). Identity research in mathematics education. Educational Studies in Mathematics, 93(1), 19–33. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10649-016-9696-5

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Darragh, L., & Radovic, D. (2018). Mathematics learner identity. In S. Lerman (Ed.), Encyclopedia of mathematics education (Living ed.). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-77487-9_100017-1

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Dumas, M. J. (2018). Beginning and ending with Black suffering: A meditation on and against racial justice in education. In E. Tuck & K. W. Yang (Eds.), Toward what justice? Describing diverse dreams of justice in education (pp. 29–46). Taylor & Francis. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781351240932-3

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Frankenstein, M. (1995). Equity in mathematics education: Class in the world outside the class. In W. G. Secada, E. Fennema, & L. B. Adajian (Eds.), New directions for equity in mathematics education (pp. 165–190). Routledge.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • García Oliveros, G., Valero Dueñas, P. X., Salazar Amaya, C., Mancer Ortiz, G., Camelo Bustos, F. J., & Romero Rey, J. H. (2013). Proceso de inclusion/exclusion: Subjetividades en educación matemática [Processes of inclusion/exclusion: Subjectivities in mathematics education]. Universidad Pedagógica Nacional, Universidad de Aalborg, Universidad Distrital Francisco José de Caldas, Colciencias.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Gholson, M. L., & Martin, D. B. (2019). Blackgirl face: Racialized and gendered performativity in mathematical contexts. ZDM, 51(3), 391–404. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11858-019-01051-x

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Gholson, M. L., & Wilkes, C. E. (2017). (Mis)taken identities: Reclaiming identities of the “collective Black” in mathematics education research through an exercise in Black specificity. Review of Research in Education, 41(1), 228–252. https://doi.org/10.3102/0091732X16686950

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Gomes da Silva, G. H., & Powell, A. B. (2016). Microagressões no ensino superior nas vias da educação matemática [Microaggressions in higher education through the pathways of mathematics education]. Revista Latinoamericana de Etnomatemática, 9(3), 44–76. https://doi.org/10.22267/relatem.1693.14

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Graven, M., & Heyd-Metzuyanim, E. (2019). Mathematics identity research: The state of the art and future directions. ZDM, 51(3), 361–377. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11858-019-01050-y

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Gutiérrez, R. (Ed.). (2013a). Equity [Special issue]. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 44(1).

  • Gutiérrez, R. (2013b). The sociopolitical turn in mathematics education. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 44(1), 37–68. https://doi.org/10.5951/jresematheduc.44.1.0037

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Hook, D. (2004). Racism as abjection: A psychoanalytic conceptualisation for a post-apartheid South Africa. South African Journal of Psychology, 34(4), 672–703. https://doi.org/10.1177/008124630403400410

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Hossain, S., Mendick, H., & Adler, J. (2013). Troubling “understanding mathematics in-depth”: Its role in the identity work of student-teachers in England. Educational Studies in Mathematics, 84(1), 35–48. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10649-013-9474-6

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Kim, J. Y. (2016). Racial emotions and the feeling of equality. University of Colorado Law Review, 87(2), 437–500. https://lawreview-dev.cu.law/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/9.-87.2-Kim_Final.pdf

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Knijnik, G. (2002). Two political facets of mathematics education in the production of social exclusion. In P. Valero & O. Skovsmose (Eds.), Proceedings of the third International Mathematics Education and Society Conference (pp. 357–363). Centre for Research in Learning Mathematics.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Kokka, K. (2022). Toward a theory of affective pedagogical goals for social justice mathematics. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 53(2), 133–153. https://doi.org/10.5951/jresematheduc-2020-0270

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Langer-Osuna, J., & Shah, N. (Eds.). (2021). Making visible the invisible: The promise and challenges of identity research in mathematics education. National Council of Teachers of Mathematics.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Martin, D. B. (2019). Equity, inclusion, and antiblackness in mathematics education. Race Ethnicity and Education, 22(4), 459–478. https://doi.org/10.1080/13613324.2019.1592833

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Martin, D. B. (2021, June 16). Rethinking equity and inclusion as racial justice models in mathematics education [Plenary talk]. Workshop on Mathematics and Racial Justice, Mathematical Sciences Research Institute. https://www.msri.org/workshops/1012/schedules/29801

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Martin, D. B., Rousseau Anderson, C., & Shah, N. (2017). Race and mathematics education. In J. Cai (Ed.), Compendium for research in mathematics education (pp. 607–636). National Council of Teachers of Mathematics.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Mendick, H. (2005). A beautiful myth? The gendering of being/doing “good at maths.” Gender and Education, 17(2), 203–219. https://doi.org/10.1080/0954025042000301465

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Moore, W. L. (2008). Reproducing racism: White space, elite law schools, and racial inequality. Rowman & Littlefield.

  • Neumayer-Depiper, J. (2013). Teacher identity work in mathematics teacher education. For the Learning of Mathematics, 33(1), 9–15. https://flm-journal.org/Articles/59540F50593D937FC7A416BD5C1692.pdf

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Radovic, D., Black, L., Williams, J., & Salas, C. E. (2018). Towards conceptual coherence in the research on mathematics learner identity: A systematic review of the literature. Educational Studies in Mathematics, 99(1), 21–42. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10649-018-9819-2

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Secada, W. G., Fennema, E., & Adajian, L. B. (Eds.). (1995). New directions for equity in mathematics education. Cambridge University Press.

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Solomon, R. C. (1998). The politics of emotion. Midwest Studies in Philosophy, 22, 1–20. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-4975.1998.tb00328.x

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Solomon, Y., Radovic, D., & Black, L. (2016). “I can actually be very feminine here”: Contradiction and hybridity in becoming a female mathematician. Educational Studies in Mathematics, 91(1), 55–71. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10649-015-9649-4

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Stentoft, D., & Valero, P. (2009). Identities-in-action: Exploring the fragility of discourse and identity in learning mathematics. Nordic Studies in Mathematics Education, 14(3), 55–77. https://vbn.aau.dk/files/18725746/Stentoft-ValeroNOMAD14_3_

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Valoyes-Chávez, L. (2018). Racism and mathematics education in a racial democracy: Views from the classroom. In U. Gellert, C. Knipping, & H. Straehler-Pohl (Eds.), Inside the mathematics class: Sociological perspectives on participation, inclusion, and enhancement (pp. 167–189). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-79045-9_8

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Valoyes-Chávez, L. E. (2021). “Me dicen negro pero eso ya no es una molestia para mí”: Historias de agencia racial en la escolaridad chilena [“They call me Black, but that does not bother me anymore”: Stories of racial agency in Chilean schooling]. Nodos y Nudos, 7(50), 47–60. https://revistas.pedagogica.edu.co/index.php/NYN/article/view/12550/10574

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • van Es, E. A., Hand, V., Agarwal, P., & Sandoval, C. (2022). Multidimensional noticing for equity: Theorizing mathematics teachers’ systems of noticing to disrupt inequities. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 53(2), 114–132. https://doi.org/10.5951/jresematheduc-2019-0018

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation

  • Vergès, F. (2021). A decolonial feminism (A. J. Bohrer, Trans.). Pluto Press.

  • Vithal, R., & Valero, P. (2003). Researching mathematics education in situations of social and political conflict. In A. J. Bishop, M. A. Clements, C. Keitel, J. Kilpatrick, & F. K. S. Leung (Eds.), Second international handbook of mathematics education (pp. 545–591). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-010-0273-8_19

    • Search Google Scholar
    • Export Citation
Copyright:
The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, Inc. All rights reserved. 2022
Page Count:
7
Article Category:
Research Article
Received:
01 Jan 2022
Accepted:
03 Mar 2022
Print Publication Date:
01 Nov 2022
Online Publication Date:
Nov 2022
All Time Past Year Past 30 Days
Abstract Views 2385 1192 83
Full Text Views 514 158 15
PDF Downloads 729 236 24
EPUB Downloads 0 0 0