Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
developed by each nation, and within each community, to face with dignity and
sovereignty the current post-contact situation with the broader Brazilian society.
Indigenous teachers pointed out the generalized lack of information about
native Peoples and their social, cultural, and economic rights in textbooks used
throughout the country's public and private schools. In various publications, native
Brazilians - invariably called
índios
- are portrayed as primitive and backwards,
needy of western schooling in order to become “educated,” which in schooling
situations inevitably results in strong prejudice about the “savage mind” (Lopes
da Silva and Ferreira 2001a). The idea that “Indians don't learn mathematics” as
easily as the
homem branco
is still quite widespread amidst the general Brazilian
population, and the world at large (Ferreira 1997, 2002a). Only recently has there
been a systematic attempt to show the variety of complex mathematical skills and
ideas elaborated by Indigenous Peoples worldwide.
Ignorance on the part of the broader Brazilian society about the historical reality
faced by the 900 thousand Indigenous individuals from more than 230 different
nations living in Brazil today, often results in a perverse form of racial discrimination,
whereby “Indianness” and even “mental disability” - in particular difficulty in
learning mathematics - are readily invoked to discount the mathematical knowledge
of Indigenous Peoples to this very day. Most workshop participants were stunned
to discover that it is precisely a profound variety of Indigenous knowledges and
practices that help constitute the incredibly rich Brazilian socio-cultural diversity.
The astonishing variety of corresponding worldviews or cosmologies, and therefore
the various forms of generating mathematical (and other forms) of knowledge was
clearly illustrated at the event with information about the historical specificity and
cultural authenticity of the six Indigenous nations from the state of São Paulo - the
richest state in Brazil, carrying one of the worse scenarios of violations of Indigenous
Peoples' rights in the country (Clastres 1995; Ferreira 2001c, 2002b; Ferreira and
Suhrbier 2002; Ladeira 2000).
This amazing cultural and ethnic diversity in Brazil at large, and in the state of
São Paulo - where most Indigenous Peoples are primarily identified as “peasants”
due to the absence of stereotypical Indigenous markers - was in fact the driving
force of the workshop. All teachers, Indigenous or not, realized from the start that
workshop participants represented Brazil's socio-cultural diversity at its best, and as
such felt compelled to research amongst themselves and learn more about the current
situation of all six Indigenous Peoples there represented, and the mathematical ideas
of each one. It is thus that each nation or Indigenous sub-group (Guarani Mbyá
and Guarani Nhandeva, for example), or those representing a particular community
or village, dedicated themselves to document their basic concerns in terms of
historical situation, identity, socio-cultural diversity, and human rights. Flourishing
mathematical ideas and concepts were then identified, discussed, and documented
by all participants collectively.
