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This article aims at investigating the form of mathematical knowledge that is transmitted in a secondary school in a context of social and institutional segregation. This article follows the premise that schools are actors in the differential distribution of different forms of knowledge to different social groups. Based on Bernstein's sociology of education, this article develops an analysis of classroom interaction and discusses it within the frames of the organisation of the school system and its socio-political relations. This methodology allows for making visible how the structuring of mathematical instruction affects the social regulation of students. The analysis reveals that the pedagogic practice is likely to lead students into a pedagogic cul-de-sac: students are deprived any form of mathematical consciousness, in esoteric as well as in mundane form. The conclusion suggests the importance of transmitting specialised knowledge in relation to its internal structure, also in contexts of intense segregation.

Sociology of education, Secondary Education, Mathematics, Knowledge, Segregation, Recontextualisation.

Straehler-Pohl, H. (2014). Mathematics, practicality and social segregation. Effects of an overtly stratifying school system. International Journal of Education for Social Justice (RIEJS), 3(1), 55-70.