A New Podcast Series Coming Soon That’s Going To Be Hated By Mathematics Education
Over 20 years ago, I was told by my friend and mentor, Peter Harrison, that mathematics was dead. That it should go the way of Latin, perhaps dead, but honoured and respected for its full character in that state.
Around that time, Paul Lockhart published his first book.
The subtitle of the book, and the quote below, perfectly sums up the disaster in mathematics education that I — and frankly, any math teacher — has taught and lived through.
If you don’t think so, then you have profited considerably from the miasma of administrative bureaucracy and rhetoric that has rarely not polluted this space.
Starting sometime this Fall, Nadia Abdelal — my sister from another mother — and I are launching a podcast that riffs heavily off of this cheating and societal misunderstanding.
And, to borrow an iconic phrase, we’re not taking any prisoners here.
Mathematics is about truth. Mathematics education is about distorting the truth about mathematics. Shakespeare could not have penned a better tragedy. The desire for efficiency/effectiveness through an addictive need of pedagogical codification for everything has been the ruin of mathematics and the creation of a cottage industry of making a wardrobe for the Emperor.
Complicit in this lie is not just the institutionalized distortion of mathematics, but also media outlets who, already working in the cheese factory of sound bite journalism, only mirror the distortion.
Most mathematics on social media is simply done as a vehicle to support the popularity of the person. If you’re more popular than the mathematics, then that is seriously fucked up.
As such, the bedrock of these podcasts will be focused on content — and maintaining lifelong curiosity for it. It’s not complicated. If we had a music podcast, we would talk about actual songs and bands — wouldn’t we?
While that will be a running thread through this series of podcasts, it’s also going to come as advertised — NSFW! And, you’re going to get this in “stereo” with the two us.
We are also here to celebrate unsung and unheard educators/teachers, who are doing amazing work in the area of CONTENT, and amplify their voices.
Just imagine this to be bar conversation around 1 am with two math educators spilling their guts to each other and the bartender who, at the very least, is intrigued by the unhinged honesty.
We’re hoping all of you are the bartenders….;)
