White privilege bolstered by teaching math

It is getting really hard to distinguish news from the Onion anymore.

I'd like to read whatever she wrote first. But, I'm not buying a book to get context

Anyway, every culture uses math and was developed in the Middle East, Asia and Europe. I don't think they actually teach kids that Pythagoras was Greek.

If you live in my area or watch sitcoms, the mathematical community is largely viewed as Asian. White kids are the jocks.

Only white people are allowed to use pi as an irrational number.

I just can't even deal. WTF?


Who gets credit for doing and developing math? Um the people who did it and developed it? What difference does their skin color make? Is she trying to say that only whites are capable of doing math?


DS struggled with math in elementary school. His teacher was no help. There were other programs at the school to help with subjects like reading but nothing for math. If minorities do worse on math evaluations than their white counterparts, that's not discrimination. They're taking the same test as everyone else. You can't get any fairer than that. Why not spend the time and energy to develop ways to help everyone struggling with math?

This.
Is.
Stupid.

Is this really not The Onion?

I'd like to read her entire chapter before drawing conclusions. Plenty of people in math/math ed say, "Hey, there are an awful lot of men in the history of mathematics--let's see how we can encourage women to be involved in math and emphasize the historical contributions women HAVE made." If she's doing the same thing but with race ("Hey, there's an awful lot of whiteness in the history of mathematics..."), I don't see a huge problem with that. It's true that many things in mathematics are named after European guys.

It's also true that standardized assessments are not free of bias, even in mathematics--mainly in word problems. The quote below (from a completely different article from 1993, not from this author) isn't about race specifically, but about how a child's environment can affect his or her performance on a math assessment:

(source)

So, I'm not willing to say based on the Fox News article that this woman is completely whackadoodle. She may well be, but I don't think I have enough info to make that call.  


As a side note: If something in mathematics has a person's name attached to it, it's a good bet that that person was NOT the one who first developed the idea. The history of mathematics is full of credit-stealing.

mmeblue raises a very valid point, and like TtT I will not buy this woman's project in order to know the actual context.

MamaP, be careful what you post! She may be coming for you next!


According to this woman's version of philosophy, has villanelle shown herself to be a skyist, an appleist, and a treeist who discriminates based upon color? The sky can be grey, red, and other colors. Apples come in yellow, green, and other colors. Trees are actually brown for the most part, but the leaves are usually green except in autumn and winter. Don't generalize that trees are green, because that means you are judging a tree based upon the color of its leaves and not the actual color of the tree. This is like judging a ginger or a blonde based on the color of hair. My hair is grey: am I automatically an old person and does that make anyone who presumes so an ageist? (<---that was all tongue in cheek.)

Seems like it