Discussing a philosophical background for the ethnomathematical program

摘要

This article examines the extent to which Wittgenstein's analytical framework may be relevant to philosophical reflection on ethnomathematics. The discussion develops Bill Barton's suggestion that a philosophical basis for the ethnomathematical program should include and explain culturally different mathematics systems, and the coexistence of different conceptions of mathematics and rationality. Wittgenstein's concept of mathematics as normative statements rather than descriptions is introduced to dialogue with ethnomathematics research and its anthropological descriptions of how mathematics is used and propagated in specific practices. It is argued that although the formulations in Wittgenstein's analytical framework alone are insufficient to account for the political character of ethnomathematics, they do provide a starting point for ethnomathematics as a nonmetaphysical version of mathematics.