engleski

Communication and popularization of mathematics - Experiences from a Practitioner

Although all mathematicians and most scientists are aware that mathematics is fundamental for the modern society, most people are used to consider mathematics as a set of fi xed rules and formulas with the only use being performing elementary calculations in daily life. There are many reasons for this, the three main being (in the author's) opinion (a) the general unwillingness of people, including journalists, to accept new information if they already have a well-formed opinion ; (b) the usual school curricula and style of teaching of many teachers of mathematics, that present mathematics without any enthusiasm whatsoever and without any insight into the creative aspects of mathematics ; (c) the general unwillingness of mathematicians to make mathematical results accessible to the general public, probably because of a fear that this would make mathematics profane. While it is true that not all mathematical topics can be made accessible to everybody, there is a large enough set of those that can. This ranges from various recreational topics, accessible to children and people without mathematical background, over applied topics like graph theory and cryptography that can easily be introduced and even elaborated to people with moderate (i.e. secondary school) mathematical background, to many research results that are of interest for and can be properly explained to the scienti c and technological community. In this presentation, the author will present several of her experiences in popularization of mathematics in Croatia, with emphasis on problems arising in popular presentations of mathematical topics and simple and e ective ideas for popular presentations.

popularisation of mathematics; science communication; popularisation activities and projects; the role of professional mathematicians in popularisation of mathematics

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