Leveraging Feminist Theory to Disrupt Gendered Mathematics Teaching and Learning

• In Event: 60.038 - Exploring Different Theoretical Frontiers in Mathematics Education Research: Toward an Empowering Mathematical Experience for All

Abstract

In this presentation, the panelists leverage three key insights from feminist theory to understand the manifest ways sexism and genderism (Esmonde, 2011), in particular, constrain what is possible for sociopolitical analyses of mathematics education, and for advancing a transformative praxis of research. These insights offer greater freedom to think radically about the role of mathematics education and research in the disruption of social oppressions. The panelists begin by recognizing schools as gendered, racialized, classed, and sexualized spaces (Mellor & Epstein, 2003), and so too, mathematics classrooms.

First, feminist theories recognize sex and gender as constructs mobilized to turn perceived differences (in bodies and behaviors) into oppositions (Mendick, 2006; West & Zimmerman, 2009). The current rhetoric and research in mathematics education does not similarly recognize this. Whether articulating gaps in achievement or opportunities, or defining pedagogies for “boys” or “girls,” the field most often relies on the normalization of gender binaries to justify inquiry instead of interrogating what these constructs presuppose, misrepresent, or obscure about mathematics learning opportunities.

Building from the first insight, the panelists argue for the centrality of variability (and not binaries) in research. Thus the second insight they leverage is intersectionality (West & Fenstermaker, 1995; Crenshaw, 1991), which recognizes the simultaneity of multiple systems of oppression (e.g., gender, race, class, (dis)ability). For example, when critiquing mathematics as a discipline reflecting social conceptions of masculinity—rigorous, logical, unemotional, objective—we privilege conceptions of white, middle-class masculinity and ignore other forms of racialized or classed masculinities (McCready, 2010). Intersectional analyses, seen elsewhere in educational research (e.g., Lei, 2003), therefore bear great promise for advancing a more transformative approach to social science research in mathematics education.

The third insight the panelist leverage takes the body as a necessary site of inquiry in understanding mathematics learning experiences. Despite the recent interest in embodiment and gesture in mathematics (e.g., Alibali & Nathan, 2012), the learner’s body itself remains largely undertheorized. And yet, considerable research attests to the regulation (and exploitation) of the racialized, gendered, and sexualized body of youth in schools (e.g., Noguera, 2003). From a feminist perspective, drawing together these literatures reminds us that social actors (peers, teachers) see, read, and interact through and on the body in profound ways that can impact what learning opportunities are possible. It was Dewey (1900/1980) who used the experience of buying classroom furniture to first illustrate how schools constrain the possibilities of learning even in physical ways (i.e., desks built for listening). Now, fat studies (influenced by feminist theories) offer related insights about how the physical learning environment, including desks, pre-imagine a learner’s body that “best fits” (Hetrick & Attig, 2009).

These three insights compel the panelists to ask, what role might normative (binary) displays of gender play in mathematics learning opportunities? How might we explore variability in these displays, and with what implications for understanding learning and identity development as intersectional projects? How might regulation of the learner’s body (talking, moving, silence) be understood as demanding visibility and/or vulnerability in learning? In short, what new inquiries might feminist theories inspire?

Authors

• Indigo Esmonde, University of Toronto - OISE

• Tesha Sengupta Irving, Vanderbilt University - Peabody College