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Authority and Politeness: Complementary Analyses of Mathematics Teaching Episodes

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Language and Communication in Mathematics Education

Part of the book series: ICME-13 Monographs ((ICME13Mo))

Abstract

In this chapter we juxtapose two analyses of episodes from a year 9 mathematics class. Particularly, we analyse the ways that a mathematics teacher managed authority relationships when he moved from a familiar context to an unfamiliar one in a much larger school. We build off an analysis using authority structures, following previous research. Then we compare that to an analysis based on politeness theory, with a focus on the effect of verbal acts on the participants’ faces. Additionally, we investigate how various verbal acts affect the definition of the situation. We conclude by comparing the revelations from the two conceptual frames; we claim that politeness theory may help us explain teachers’ and students’ choices of particular authority structures in their classroom interactions.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Primary Education, University of Ioannina, 45110 University Campus, Ioannina, Greece

    Konstantinos Tatsis

  2. Faculty of Education, University of New Brunswick, P.O. Box 4400, Fredericton, NB, E3B 5A3, Canada

    David Wagner

Authors
  1. Konstantinos Tatsis
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  2. David Wagner
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Konstantinos Tatsis .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Education Department, University of California, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, California, USA

    Judit N. Moschkovich

  2. Faculty of Education, University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada

    David Wagner

  3. Centre for Education Innovation and Action, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Bombay, India

    Arindam Bose

  4. Faculty of Education, State University of Campinas, Campinas, São Paulo, Brazil

    Jackeline Rodrigues Mendes

  5. Institut für Erziehungswissenschaft, Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden, Germany

    Marcus Schütte

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Tatsis, K., Wagner, D. (2018). Authority and Politeness: Complementary Analyses of Mathematics Teaching Episodes. In: Moschkovich, J., Wagner, D., Bose, A., Rodrigues Mendes, J., Schütte, M. (eds) Language and Communication in Mathematics Education. ICME-13 Monographs. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-75055-2_13

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-75055-2_13

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-75054-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-75055-2

  • eBook Packages: EducationEducation (R0)

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