Between hegemonic epistemologies and other knowledge: mathematics at the crossroads

La matemática en la encrucijada

Abstract

In the current global political and social scenario, on the one hand, especially in Brazil, scientific negationism has contributed to sustain necropolitics; and, on the other hand, ways of being in the world associated with a hegemonic notion of progress have been associated with the covid-19 pandemic, as well as with other imminent environmental and social crises. In this sense, other forms of knowledge, especially the ones from historically invisible peoples and cultures, can inspire paths that are more sustainable than the ones associated with hegemonic epistemologies. In this paper, we propose some reflections upon these two facets from a perspective of modernity/coloniality (e.g. Quijano, 2000). Provoked by these reflections, and resuming previous works (XXX, 2018, 2019), we discuss the role of mathematics as a school discipline in the production of views on the so-called “exact” sciences and on their role in contemporary societies. Inspired by the Pedagogy of Crossroads and, more specifically, by its concepts of epistemological rolê and cruzo (Rufino, 2018, 2019), we challenge ourselves to claim a mathematical education in which hegemonic epistemologies and other knowledge are not put in confrontation, but are invited to the game.