Students' mathematical lives are characterized not only by a set of mathematical ideas and the engagement in mathematical thinking, but also by social relations, specifically, relations of authority. Watching student actions and speaking to students, one becomes cognizant of a "web of authority" ever present in mathematics classrooms. In…

This paper compares the way lessons on systems of linear equations unfold in a classroom in the Negev region of Israel with the way they unfold in a Shanghai and Hong Kong classroom. Lessons are viewed as temporal entities describable not only by the nexus of topics they contain but also by how they flow in time. In this light, the lessons in the…

Compared to studies in general education, authority has received little attention in mathematics education, despite an increasing interest in sociological perspectives in mathematics classroom research. The subject of authority is particularly important in mathematics education, on the one hand, because of the immense authority mathematics itself…