FROM THE UGLY DUCKLING TO THE SWAN: LITERATURE AS A WAY TO REDESIGN MATHEMATICS

Abstract

The image of Mathematics as a difficult, selective, and inaccessible subject constitutes a historically constructed social representation that influences learning experiences and contributes to feelings of fear, insecurity, and academic failure. In this context, this study aims to analyze how literature, understood as an experience of language and the production of meaning, can contribute to the re-signification of the social image of Mathematics. This is a qualitative study of a theoretical and interpretative nature, developed through bibliographic research and grounded in the fields of Mathematics Education, Philosophy of Language, and Literary Studies. The analysis brings together the contributions of Skovsmose, D'Ambrosio, Vygotsky, Bakhtin, Ricoeur, Duval, Candido, and Cosson, using Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale The Ugly Duckling as an interpretative framework to understand the construction and transformation of the representations attributed to mathematical knowledge. The findings indicate that the difficulties commonly associated with Mathematics stem not only from its epistemological complexity but also from socially shared discourses and beliefs that shape the ways students and teachers relate to the subject. As its main theoretical contribution, the study proposes the concept of Narrative Re-signification of Mathematics, understood as the process of reconstructing the social representations of Mathematics through experiences of language, reading, interpretation, and dialogue. It is concluded that the integration of Literature and Mathematics Education expands the possibilities for constructing meaning in mathematical knowledge, fostering more inclusive, humanizing, and critically oriented pedagogical practices.