When Numbers Feel White: Emotionality, Microaggressions, and Identity in Math Education

Session Type: Symposium

Abstract

This symposium examines how whiteness emotionality operates in mathematics classrooms to shape racialized identity and belonging. Although math is often framed as racially neutral, emotional responses such as defensiveness, control, and microaggressions serve to protect whiteness– marginalizing students of color. As Martin (2012) argues, teachers’ deficit framed views of Blackness significantly shape Black students’ math experiences and internalized identities. This panel draws from whiteness studies, connecting whiteness emotionality to stereotype threat and STEM identity research. Panelists explore how students experience math as a site of emotional sorting and epistemic exclusion (McGee & Martin, 2010). This session engages in unforgetting of math’s role in sustaining whiteness through emotional and ideological control, offering critical contributions toward imagining emotionally just, identity affirming spaces.

Sub Unit

• Division G - Social Context of Education

Chair

• Cheryl E. Matias, University of San Diego

Papers

• White Feelings, Black and Brown Fatigue: The Emotional Weight of Mathematical Legitimacy - Jennifer A. Chabriel-Amara, University of San Diego; Nallely Gecik, University of San Diego; Cheryl E. Matias, University of San Diego

• Black Students’ Perceptions of Mathematics Teacher Treatment on their Mathematics Motivation - Charlotte A. Agger, Indiana University; Korinthia D. Nicolai, Indiana University; Monica L. Miles, University at Buffalo - SUNY; Whitney N. McCoy, Duke University; Terrell R Morton, University of Illinois at Chicago

• Whiteness, Emotionality, and Novice Teachers’ Commitments to Anti-Racist Mathematics Teaching - Craig J. Willey, Indiana University - Indianapolis

• “There Are a Lot of Ignorant Students”: Girls of Color Perspectives About Discussing Controversial Issues in Mathematics Class - Kari Kokka, University of Nevada - Las Vegas

Session Organizer

• Jennifer A. Chabriel-Amara, University of San Diego

Discussant

• Danny Bernard Martin, University of Illinois at Chicago