Defining issues in Ed Ling

[Robert Parks]

Richard,
You wrote:
>Part of learning mathematics is about learning how to talk like a
>mathematician, but it is not enough, for me, for us to study how
>mathematicians talk, or how to teach children how to talk like a
>mathematician - the relationship between the talk and the mathematics
>is crucial, and for me, an important area of work for educational
>linguistics. And equally for the other curriculum areas...

I think you have hit an important point in the dialectic of education
and linguistics.  What is needed is a model of language that
identifies the conceptual development required to participate in
mathematical discussion - the  language of mathematics.  But on the
other hand, different realms of discourse (home language, school
language, etc) contain and nurture mathematical ideas. So part of the
point of mathematical language is to partition off a sphere of
discourse, and create the conceptual leverage  required to bring
students into the conversation. This conceptual leverage operates by
adding new meanings to terms in the home/school languages, as well as
adding new terms to the students' verbal repertoirs.  I would propose
that we need an inventory of the terminological and conceptual moves
that are/should be made in bringing students into the specifically
mathematical discourse. And part of the problem will be to introduce
the idea of a "realm of discourse" (discipline) in which a small
group of people decide exactly what they want to mean by their
"language".

Am I giving an adequate interpretation to your point?

Bob Parks