Heads of Department of Mathematical Sciences, Birmingham, 8 th April 2008 Imagining mathematicians: issues of gender Heather Mendick

Heads of Department of Mathematical Sciences, Birmingham, 8th April 2008

Imagining mathematicians: issues of genderHeather Mendick


What we did2 groups of participants: • Year 10 – 11 students • Year 2 – 3 undergraduates (and a few

postgraduates) Contrasting: schools/universities, views & choices on

maths

4 phases of data collection and analysis:• Survey (556 questionnaires completed by Year 10

students; 100 second year university undergraduates)

• ‘Texts’ (identified from the survey)• Focus groups (15 with Year 11 students; 12 with

university students) • Individual interviews (27 with Year 11 students; 23

with university students)


Absence of Maths/Mathematicians?

Thinking about images of maths and mathematicians in popular culture, pick 2 you remember clearly and fill in the information about each in the boxes below:Name and where you saw it:Describe the main things that you remember about it:What were your opinions and feelings about it?

Blank example 1: 163/648 = 25%Blank example 2: 318/648 = 49%


Top 10 Maths/Mathematicians in Pop Culture

BBC bitesize 117Countdown 85A Beautiful Mind 58Sudoku 54Mymaths 32Good Will Hunting 20Quizzes, horoscopes, articles in magazines (Cosmopolitan, Sugar) 12The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time 12Deal or No Deal 7Pi 7


The ubiquity of maths in popular culture

Numb3rs … Fermat’s Last Theorem (book) … Get Rid of Your Maths Gremlins adverts … Monopoly … Radio quizzes … Rainman … Sport (cricket, tennis, football, darts, snooker) … Fermat’s Last Theorem (TV) … Newspaper articles … Stand and Deliver … The Da Vinci Code (book) … Stephen Hawking (on Simpsons and Richard and Judy) … Back to the Future … Beauty and the Geek … Catch Me if You Can … Digital Fortress … Dr Kamshima’s Brain Training … Einstein … Primes on Radio … Primes on TV … My Wife and Kids … The Da Vinci Code (film) … The Weakest Link … Who Wants to Be a Millionaire



The Britney TheoremThe Guardian, 7th July, 2007


Mathematicians, Masculinity, Middle-classness

Researcher: What are they wearing these mathematicians?Jesus: Suits. Chantz: Shirt and tie.Ashley: Gotta be a shirt hasn’t it? [GCSE students, male/female/male]

Sarah: Because they might be a lot higher than say a maths teacher or like the highest possible sort of thing. [GCSE student, female]

Maya: Yeah, I think they’re [mathematicians] quite middle-class. It depends actually, in the, not in this school.Candi: Because I reckon, you know, to kind of gain that, very kind of level, that level of intelligence you’d have to go to university. I imagine it coming quite easily to them being brought up in a kind of good family. [GCSE students, female]


Mathematicians and Whiteness

Louise Archer and Becky Francis (2007, p.52): associations of natural cleverness with Asian people are a “negative positive” that reinforces their construction as Other:

“In particular, the stereotype was felt to homogenise or distort young people’s academic experiences, misrepresent their efforts and achievements and created a pressure of expectation that was experienced as oppressive. Moreover the notion of cleverness was also pathologised and formed the flip side to a more overtly negative discourse of ‘Chinese geeks’.”


Mathematicians as geeks: mental health http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsZIVwLxfe8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8P0YmgQTbA

Luigi: In A Beautiful Mind, Russell Crowe, he was like amazing at maths, solving numbers and stuff. He could just like see numbers and he could solve, like, really complex things, but then he was like schizophrenic. …Bob: I am not sure if it is a disease, it’s called Asperger’s Syndrome most people that do have Asperger’s syndrome are actually amazing at maths but they have like side effects like schizophrenia and things like that that stop them going out. [GCSE students, male]

“crazy hair”, “is he crazy or is he just clever?”“disturbed”, “nuts”, “weird”, “mental”“skill”, “commitment”, “devotion”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsZIVwLxfe8



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8P0YmgQTbA


Mathematicians as geeks/genius: lifestyle

Obsessive: “working endlessly at a desk trying to work out a formula or something”, spending “their spare time … doing extra maths questions” and “dedicated to what they do”.

There’s different types of maths, there’s like genius maths, which is working out these equations and winning big prizes. … Then there’s loads of different other sorts of maths like the sort of maths that apply to engineering or apply to accountancy or anything. … So I think there’s, like there’s maths maths, like working out complex equations and stuff, is more a thing that you see as someone who just sits at home with a desk, staying up till two o’clock working out this equation. Whereas applied maths you just think someone, just like a more normal person in a job, even though the maths might be similar. [Firefly, GCSE student, male]


Mathematicians as geniuses: ‘natural’ ability

Annie: The people that you know sat in their rooms and thought about things that no one would ever even’ve, like, how did even someone even start to think about Pythagoras’ theorem and stuff, what on earth? How? It doesn’t make sense. So you just think of them as something, I don’t know, elite, you know, different from everyone else. [GCSE student, female]

Freakish stories: e.g.uncle who “like proved Pythagoras’ Theorem when he was 10”‘Commonsense’ statements: e.g. that “everybody has their talents”Stories of getting by without work e.g. “there are still some people that misbehave but they’ve got the image that they can coast through all the work”


Gender and ‘natural’ ability

Alice: But if you just teach them … then they learn maths but it doesn’t mean that. You can’t produce mathematicians. You know you have to born as a mathematician, real. [mathematics undergraduate, female]

GCSE students: ‘Very good’ at maths:33 people or 11% of males; 7 people or 3% of females ‘Good’ at maths: 39% compared with 35%


Critical awareness of clichés

Wilbert: If you have always seen it on the telly [and] you haven’t seen anything else of what that person or what that thing is, then you’re going to think that when you think of it. [GCSE student, male]

Annie: If you look in films and TV series like Saved by the Bell and stuff you don’t see geeky girls. Phoebe: That is true but there is very many, there’s quite a lot of geeky girls. But they, in lessons they just do their work, they don’t speak to, they don’t socialise. [GCSE students, female]



Reading Danica 1

Leslie (male): You don't really imagine mathematicians to be like, I don't know, casually dressed.

Candi (female): As much as I kind of hate to admit it myself, she just doesn’t seem, doesn’t seem like the type I’d imagine would be good at maths.

Elizabeth (female): she looks unintelligent because she “looks more like a popstar.”

Pisces (male): maybe I’m being stereotypical, but I don’t consider actors as that clever.


Reading Danica 2

Grace and Donna described her as “confident” and Mansa as a “very intelligent” and “nice young lady”.

Mansa, Sam, Louise, Ellie and Maria liked the way she breaks the stereotype of mathematicians as male and shows that you can be clever and attractive.

Ellie: “it’s saying you can be attractive and intelligent and study maths and it’s not a bad thing.”


Reading Carol

Some GCSE and university students objected to the image as an attempt to ‘sex up’ mathematics:- rejection of portrayals of women as sex objects- incompatibility of sexuality and mathematics: “that’s not what maths is about, it’s got nothing to do with that”

Some female social sciences and humanities students praised how she challenged stereotypes: “an attractive young woman who is highly intelligent as well … Who says you can’t do maths in stockings?”“why not use your sexuality when you can?”

Documents

Heads of Department of Mathematical Sciences, Birmingham, 8 th April 2008 Imagining mathematicians: issues of gender Heather Mendick