Choosing Cruel Optimism: What Relational Ethics Offers “Equitable” Mathematics Education

The marginalizing effects of mathematics education, particularly for students who are also marginalized by racism, poverty, and other intersecting forms of oppression, are well-documented. In response, many educators and researchers claim that it is mathematics teachers’ ethical responsibility to adopt equitable instructional practices. In this chapter, I argue that equitable practices, which are often taken for granted in pursuit of more equitable mathematics education, exist in relation to what Lauren Berlant calls cruel optimism: where what we are drawn to paradoxically makes it harder to achieve our desires. I examine the cruelty of three common “equitable” practices through a lens of relational ethics and suggest that we, who are interested in justice, might actively choose cruelty.