What is Social Justice Mathematics (SJM)?

Social Justice Mathematics (SJM) generally aims to use dominant mathematics to analyze injustices and interrogate systems of oppression to take action toward justice, like Freire (1970) refers to reading and writing the world (Gutstein, 2006). Students' mathematical analyses can motivate them to take action, or students' understanding of injustices can motivate them to learn the dominant mathematics to further interrogate inequities and organize for action. I have theorized three dimensions of SJM that refer to (a) critical pedagogical goals, or the social justice goals and actions to work toward equity and justice, (b) dominant pedagogical goals, or the school mathematics learning goals, as described by state standards, textbooks, exams, etc., and (c) affective pedagogical goals, where students feel that their emotions and well-being are cared for, where students have opportunities to process emotions related to dominant mathematics (e.g., developing confidence with school mathematics), and opportunities to identify and process emotions to take action (e.g., leveraging anger, empathy, etc. for action) (Kokka, 2022).