Desenvolvimento disciplinar da educação matemática na UFRN: um estudo exploratório da circulação das teorias internacionais (1997-2020)

Abstract

This dissertation consists of research performed in the field of the Social History of Mathematics Education, highlighting contributions made by the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN) in the disciplinary development of Mathematics Education as a scientific field, during the period between 1997 and 2020. This study is based on our collection of 146 works, 98 of which are dissertations and 48 in Mathematics Education, produced by this institution, in three graduate programs: (1) Graduate Program in Education (PPGEd); (2) Graduate Program in Teaching of Natural Sciences and Mathematics (PPGECNM) and (3) Graduate Program in Teaching of Sciences and Mathematics (PPGECM). The objective of this research is to investigate which international theories of Mathematics Education still circulate within these scientific works. The hypothesis presented is that very few theories of Mathematics Education consolidated outside Brazil and disseminated worldwide support the dissertations and theses produced at UFRN. As a theoretical foundation, we relied on the concepts pertinent to the Field of Science proposed by Pierre Bourdieu (2004) and Conceptual Evolutionism idealized by Stephen Toulmin (1972) to outline the evolutionary process of Mathematical Education, from both practical and academic standpoints. During our investigation, we consulted archives related to the Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (CAPES) in addition to those of the aforementioned Graduate Programs; the Lattes Platform curriculum of dissertation advisors and graduate students and the Brazilian Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations (BTDT). This work is methodologically configured as meta-research and is analytical in nature, as proposed by Bicudo (2011) and Mainardes (2018). The information was obtained using 3 primary methods: (a) testimonial, consisting of the researcher's autobiographical narrative and the professor's testimony. Dr. Iran Abreu Mendes, first student to defend a Master's thesis in Mathematics Education at UFRN; (b) documentary; composed of texts related to Mathematical Education (Mendes, 2008; Garnica and Sousa, 2012; González, 2015) and (c) empirical; through the examination of theories in the referenced dissertations and theses. After the analyses, nine of the ten theories investigated appear in dissertations and theses. It was observed that the Theory of Conceptual Fields, the Ontosemiotic Approach and the Anthropological Theory of Didactics are still very little explored and Ethnomathematics, proposed by Ubiratan D'Ambrosio, has become the international theory of Mathematics Education most present in research in this field developed at UFRN.