Sarvodaya Samaj: the link between social justice and mathematics

Pooja Keshavan Singh

Mathematics continues to ‘enjoy’ an elitist position in the minds of its stakeholders. It has been the gatekeeper subject for decades. Many people live with guilt all their lives for not being able to do mathematics confidently while they always ‘managed’ the exams. No matter how well placed they are in life this feeling of inadequacy lingers on. Should it or should it not, is, seemingly, a personal choice but in reality it is not. Let us see why?

According to historical records, in 1835 Lord Macaulay addressed the British parliament with his understanding of India and its cultural heritage. He told the gathering that India is so rich in every aspect that the only way to enslave it is to break its backbone which is its ancient and robust education system. Unless the Indians lose their self-esteem and take pride in everything that is foreign or English, Britain would not succeed. As a measure to colonise us psychologically the British started schooling a selected few in English language and mathematics to create the class versus mass divide. It is not that the Indian society was homogeneous prior to this but now the basis of division was English education and it was to be glamorized henceforth.

Our colonisers succeeded in alienating us from our roots through English education and through rejection of everything that was indigenous. We continue to live with the burden of our collective memories of colonisation. Indian children rarely feel the pride of belonging to a nation that pioneered scientific and mathematical discoveries much before the world could think about them. We never read about the systematic work done by Aryabhatta and Bhaskaracharya like we have read about Euclid and Newton. This is the reason why mathematics remains on the ‘pedestal’, because it belongs to another culture altogether.

Gandhiji was aware of this divide and he incessantly fought to restore the lost pride of Indian people. He knew that our education system alone could help attain a ‘Sarvodaya Samaj’ in which the vertical and horizontal gaps between various classes is minimized. He also advocated that education be inclusive of 3Hs instead of 3Rs, that is the Head, the Hand, and the Heart. Sadly, where we stand today is the direct opposite of where Gandhiji wanted us to be. Through this article I want to establish a link between how teaching of mathematics can help us move towards a more equitable society as envisioned by Gandhiji.

We are aware of how we continue to study mathematics content that lacks any real world, let alone socially relevant, contexts. Mathematics is seen as a subject that eases social mobility rather than criticality. ‘Social Justice Math’ aims to integrate social justice issues into mathematics classes. It has two main components. The first component consists of lessons and investigations that increase students’ math literacy, problem solving, reasoning, and critical thinking abilities. The second component is, understanding issues of social, political, and economic justice via a mathematical lens and developing mathematically sound solutions to address these problems (Osler 2007). Let me explain this through some examples of classroom lessons.

Statistics: We can begin by teaching students how to design and conduct survey-based investigations on issues that relate to them. For instance, students can find out the availability of public conveniences in the neighbourhood and compare it with the recommended norms for public health. On the same lines students can find out about the law and order situation in the neighbourhood and find out the availability of police personnel per person and the facilities available to them. These resources can then be compared with other countries on various parameters.

Average: Students can find out the average response time of emergency services like Ambulance, Police, and Fire. They can discuss the implications for public and suggest ways to improve them. Students can compare the average salaries of professionals in metros, suburban towns, and rural areas. They can hence understand the basis of salary calculation and also the reasons why metros are overcrowded.

Geometry: Students can determine the health hazard to a city due to unregulated solid waste dumping in landfills. They could also compare the current map of a city with an old map to see the transformation of land usage, for instance, playgrounds being converted into parking lots and farmlands being converted into commercial hubs. These changes have grave implications for the environment and people living in the vicinity. Students can understand these with numbers related to rise in pollution levels in the city.

Operations: Students can find the cost budgeting of a family in rural and urban areas. Find out the minimum wages required and compare it with ‘below the poverty line’ criteria published by the government. Students can learn to perform operations in ways other than the traditional algorithms, for instance, the Egyptian or Mayan system or Vedic mathematics. This helps to promote multiculturalism.

Graphs: Students can plot the sources of electricity generation in the country, find out their carbon footprints and realize the need to move to renewable sources. How many students are aware of the fact that even today the bulk of our energy requirements are met with fossil fuels? Students could also compare the shortfall in supply during the year in different states and country as a whole. Students could also find correlation between pollution and child asthma, urbanization and cancer occurrence, working class parents and school dropouts.

Fractions: Students can compare the annual budget allocations to social sectors like health and education, and defence. Students can also discuss the recent reduction of budget allocations to the social sector and its implications on the ground.

In a country where the day-wise curriculum is planned and handed down to the teacher by higher authorities (this is equivalent to colonising the classroom though), teaching ‘Social Justice Math’ seems impossible. Right? I agree because this will lead to a lot of ruffled feathers and uncomfortable questions but it is worth the effort if we can imagine the changed order this can lead to. Not only do we need to change our focus while planning the curriculum but we also need to empower the teacher with the required tools to throw light on such issues. The teacher and students need access to authentic sources of data to be able to discuss the numbers, sometimes the students might have to file an RTI to get the required information as well. Lessons planned around such themes may also need working knowledge of various tools of mathematics and also some extra time. It sounds interesting though.

All the above examples show that many pressing societal issues can be explored with a lot of rigour and exactitude using tools of mathematics. Mathematics provides the numbers that make the investigations impressionable for students. When students realize that our society has so much uneven distribution of resources and what it ought to be they will grow up to question the status quo. Questioning and awareness are the beginning of establishing the ‘Sarvodaya samaj’ envisioned by the father of our nation.

Reference
Osler, 2007. Downloaded from http://www.radicalmath.org/docs/SJMathGuide.pdf on October 1, 2014.

The author has been teaching mathematics and mathematics pedagogy courses for many years. She can be reached at poojakeshavan@yahoo.com.