Inside the Mathematics Class by Uwe Gellert & Christine Knipping & Hauke Straehler-Pohl

Author:Uwe Gellert & Christine Knipping & Hauke Straehler-Pohl
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783319790459
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

3 Theoratical Approach

In the paragraphs below, I first discuss the notions of hegemony and ideology to set the terrain characterizing racial domination as embedded in discourses and practices. Then, I characterize the notion of racial ideology and its function in racialized societies as a tool to understand racial dynamics inside the mathematics classroom.

3.1 Hegemony

There is no doubt about the role of schools in forging forms of consciousness that help individuals realize their places and functions in the social world; such places and roles are usually aligned to the general social expectations based on individuals’ social backgrounds and identities. School contributes to give meaning to the roles that individuals are expected to perform in society and, in this way, to maintain an already established social order without the use of force or coercion (Apple 1990). In this context, ideology surges as an important notion to help scholars comprehend reproduction and domination at school.

However, schools are not just sites for ideological reproduction. Students, parents, teachers, and staff carry out processes of resistance and contestation. Giroux (2004) indicates the need for a notion of ideology that allows scholars to capture and more deeply understand the complexity of the processes of domination and resistance within the social practices of teaching and learning. Such a notion should transcend traditional approaches considering ideololy as a false consciousness aimed to distort “real” relations among individuals or as a set of ideas located in people’s mind.

Taking into account Giroux’s call, in this paper I draw upon the Gramsci’s notion of hegemony (Gramsci 1975). Hegemony characterizes particular consensus —in historical terms — in the life of societies within defined moments. During these hegemonic periods a degree of unity has been achieved by a social bloc–the civil society–, comprising diverse forces and organizations. The social bloc sets up a historical agenda under its leadership and moral and epistemological authority by installing a collective will in intellectual, political and economic terms. The mechanisms through which the social bloc exercises control in society are distinctive and critical in understanding how a particular worldview is imposed. According to Gramsci (1975), the imposition of this will does not involve force but subtle, pedagogical processes, persuasion or cognitive manipulation (van Dijk 1992) that present the hegemonic bloc’s interests and ideas as universal and natural. It is also established by the saturation of meanings and values that end up constituting the consciousness of individuals (Williams 1981), their subjectivity. The power of hegemonic ideologies relies, precisely, in this feature. Second, despite the broad consensus reached in the hegemonic periods, conflict and contradiction characterize the dynamics of society. This is because within society there are sites for contradiction and confrontation insofar as the “hegemonic bloc does not totally control popular consciousness” (Apple 2016, p. 880).

From this perspective, ideology refers to practices and moments in social processes aimed to produce forms of consciousness and subjectivity. It comprises ideas, feelings, desires, and moral preferences through which people assume daily and ordinary events as natural and taken-for-granted. They provide people with

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