3月15日13時に第15期公募情報を公開いたしました。
4月1日13時より応募者登録サイトへの登録が可能です。
Information on the 15th call for applications was opened at 13:00 on 15 March.
Applicants can register on the registration website from 1 April at 13:00.
Number concepts in non-literate societies from an ethnomathematical perspective
This talk deals with number concepts in non-literate societies. To distinguish them from Western mathematics, I employ the termethnomathematics (D’Ambrosio 1977), which has been used to refer to various aspects of the relationship between mathematics and culture. My work engages in analysis and description of several endangered or little-studied languages, in particular Malagasy (Tandroy dialect), Rurutu and Rapa Nui. In the same way as languages, number concepts exist universally across all human societies, ethnic groups, and regions. Field surveys I carried out in Madagascar, French Polynesia, and Rapa Nui (Easter Island) revealed that counting systems and any other natural cognition in these societies are closely related to their local languages, a finding that gives rise to several intriguing questions. In this research project, I not only look at linguistic number categories but also carefully observe the relationships between local peoples and the natural phenomena as manifested in cultural phenomena such as agricultural calendars, botanic cycles, the motion of celestial bodies, and the calculation of the seasons.