Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
ancestral territories in central Brazil. Questions asked included: If the Xavante were
as “savage” and “primitive” as the media often portrayed them to be, how could
they know any mathematics? Wasn't mathematics only for the so-called civilized,
smart and wealthy White people? Did their mathematical knowledge of the land,
waterways, peoples, spirits, animals, plants, and stars in the sky help them secure so
much land? Do they count beyond infinity? (Details about the Xavante numerical
system, discussed with pleasure and in great detail by all 60 mathematics educators
present at the workshop, are explored ahead in Part 3 of this topic.)
Knowing that there are diverse mathematical wisdoms, different ways of
reckoning time, space and the body, valorizes and enriches the process of knowledge
construction - a basic tenet of the quality education that Brazilian Indigenous
Peoples have the right to, as expressed in the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous Peoples:
Article 21.
Indigenous Peoples have the right, without discrimination, to the improvements of
their economic and social conditions, including, inter alia, in the areas of education,
employment, vocational training and retraining, housing, sanitation, health and
social security (…)
Article 31.
Indigenous Peoples have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their
cultural heritage, traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions, as well
as the manifestations of their sciences, technologies and cultures, including human
and genetic resources, seeds, medicines, knowledge of the properties of fauna and
flora, oral traditions, literatures, designs, sports and traditional games and visual and
performing arts. They also have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop
their intellectual property over such cultural heritage, traditional knowledge, and
traditional cultural expressions (…)
“So what does it really mean,” asked Alício Terena,
to say that we have the right to improve our economic and social conditions,
including education, employment, housing and more? Is it only in the Estados
Unidos where these rights happen, or can it happen to us? I don't understand
about the Nações Unidas , but I want to be a part of it. And how far away
are the Xavante from us right now? Tell me! [Teachers are consulting their
maps…] São Paulo to Cuiabá [capital of Mato Grosso], mil seiscentos e trinta
e quatro kilômetros [1132 miles]? I am learning more and more about Brazilian
Indians and our mathematics, and right now I feel like counting how many of
us are in the same situation. We lost our lands - how much land? Our people
were killed, how many? We still have our culture, our language - how many
speakers? If we get together, our numbers will be bigger. What did you say,
Mariana, about the Palikur people, way up there na ponta do Brasil [at the
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