Abstract
This chapter introduces a conceptualisation of explaining as mathematical discursive practices of navigating through different epistemic fields and uses this framework for analysing collective explanations in whole-class discussions. The framework coordinates Interactional Discourse Analysis from linguistics with interactionist and epistemological perspectives from mathematics education. After outlining the main ideas of the three perspectives on explaining, I describe how the notion of practices functionally links theories from linguistics and mathematics education. Furthermore, I show how the conceptualisation simultaneously highlights the interactive nature of explaining processes while also keeping the mathematical content in focus. Finally, I outline the method of identifying explaining practices in transcribed video data.
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The research project INTERPASS (Interactive procedures for establishing matches and divergences in linguistic and microcultural practices) is funded by the German ministry BMBF (grant 01JC1112, grant holder S. Prediger). I have conducted it under the guidance of Susanne Prediger and Uta Quasthoff, together with Anna-Marietha Vogler and Vivien Heller.
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Erath, K. (2018). Explaining as Mathematical Discursive Practices of Navigating Through Different Epistemic Fields. 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_10
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