KULCHA Symposium Presenter, Myron A. Medina: Weaving Indigenous Maya Mathematics Alongside Maya Elders in Belize

Myron A. Medina,

Born and Raised Belizean, Santa Elena, Cayo (West is best!)

PhD Candidate (ABD), University of British Columbia, Canada

OAS Scholar (2010, 2016)

Mathematics Education Researcher

University Lecturer

Research Interest: Curriculum Studies Research, Mathematics Education, Qualitative Research Methodologies, Pedagogy, Research Design and Method, Sensory Ethnography, Mathematical Research, Ethnomathematics (Indigenous Mathematics), and Culture and the Senses.

My first love has and continues to be mathematics.

About the Presentation

Thematic Session: Traditional Knowledge Systems - September 3rd, 2021 from 8:45 AM to 10:00 AM (UTC-6:00)

My study argues that an exploration of Indigenous mathematics, ways of knowing, doing, and being through culture-based practices of Maya Elders, can enact and create a more enlivening and empowering mathematics curriculum. I use the term weaving as a metaphor to conceptualize mathematics as a fabric of interlaced concepts. I use it as a means to explore specific mathematical knowing in and through these strands of cultural fibers. This presentation argues that mathematics far from being immaterial and disembodied (absolute, abstract, and eternal) is deeply material, human, and cultural.

Using sensory ethnography (Pink, 2009), my study explores and analyzes Maya practices by paying close attention to sensory experiences, ways of experiencing, and ways of knowing and being. This sensory ethnographic study focuses on learning through the embodied, enacted ecological knowledge of the Maya that has been cultivated through generations in close contact with nature. This study uses contemporary practices to contextualize and explore Indigenous Maya mathematics.

I document and interpret participants’ ways of knowing, reasoning, and sensory experiences through participant observations, un-coerced conversations, photography, participants’ collaborative work, and field notes. This research is about those experiences in relationship with six knowledgeable Elders who generously shared their knowledge with me, and of the land itself. At its heart, my study (2018 - 2021) explores mathematics as a creative, cultural, and human form of expression – a journey of discovery, and a spiritual world. It is about recognizing and valuing Indigenous knowledge in and through the act of doing as a means of challenging our sense of what we mean by mathematics.