Jack Evans' Blog

  I really enjoyed the ethnomathematics activities that we did yesterday. All the activities highlighted how maths is present and rooted in the many various cultures presented around the world. There were games and activities from as early as the middle ages and all the way back to before the Romans in the 8th century BCE. In my opinion, I think this is an attest to how maths can be considered a present aspect of all of human history. It is something we tend to not think about but doing the maths activities made me think about that even more. In many cases,such as the game Mancala. Looking at it at first glance I would not expect it to be considered a game that is rooted with mathematics. It was interesting to learn that the game was created in 1400 BCE and was intended to symbolise the different stages of agriculture. I think what they stated in their presentation was true to what we can consider in relation to maths being that it can teach students the importance of maths and how emb

  In week 5 we talked a lot about the future of ethnomathematics in the context of past and future colonial history. In the context of colonialism I believe it has a tendency to re-write our understanding of things to cater to it and the individuals who benefit from it. Unfortunately from what we have learned maths and ethnomathematics is not immune to colonialism. In many cases, maths nowadays for us takes the viewpoints of that of a eurocentric. To me this has made maths very black and white and not colourful. I think if it was more colourful and not so colonised, allowing different cultural maths to be present would allow us to understand it more. In my case, I have struggled with maths and believed there was only one way to do it. However, learning the history of ethnomathematics has taught me that maths comes from every corner of the world. But it does seem as thought Europe, the West, and colonialism have tried to claim maths for themselves.  Whereas maths is both European, India