UC Irvine

This qualitative dissertation contributes to a pressing call for new models of queering mathematics curriculum and content and following how such a queering unfolds in practice. As part of this dissertation, I present three studies. Falling in line with existing visibility studies centering the queer experience in STEM, the first study zooms in on the lived experiences and perceptions of queer students in mathematics, drawing on interview data from queer undergraduate and graduate students. Through an iterative thematic analysis, this first study highlights four themes, characterizing present curricular practices as inequitable (i.e., reinforcing the binary, reinforcing neutrality, math as fixed, math as gendered), and one theme proposing a path forward (i.e., infusing the self). The second study builds on the first study by taking the derived design goals as a starting point for the design and implementation of a queering of mathematics. Grounded in queer theory as aligned with constructionism, and drawing on methods in design-based research, this study traces the design and implementation of a queering of mathematics in an interdisciplinary undergraduate course at UCI, straddling mathematics, robotics, and textile arts, with the goal of disrupting normative practices with new tools and materials, i.e., materials-to-queer-with. Course data (e.g., student reflections, video and artifact data) all informed an evaluation of my design conjectures as a basis for my analysis in this study. Embracing the materiality of learning in the course – through color, different media, and tools, – supported a disruption of the binary, with additional findings uncovering new ways of engaging in the “doing of mathematics”. Lastly, the third study examines the potential impacts of a queering of mathematics, as surfaced through the student experience in the course. Drawing on student reflection data at two time points in the course – the second and last week of class – this qualitative study, first surfaces themes around student’s lived experiences with normative practices in STEM before foregrounding the ways in which the course departed from normative STEM practices in meaningful ways. Findings highlight the importance of learning in cross-disciplinary contexts for improved group work in which students’ ideas are well-represented and their strengths and unique expertise seen as valuable. Furthermore, findings underscore the value in bringing one’s identity and what is personally-meaningful to them to the table and pivoting to work in STEM from a place of joy, with design implications for more equitable learning opportunities.