RESENHA

Abstract

Brazilian academic production could use more deep works on the history and education of mathematics. Facetas do Diamante - Facets of the Diamond -, which is mainly written in Portuguese and published by the Brazilian Society for the History of Mathematics - SBHMat -, comes into our hands as a satisfactory and competent attempt to better the situation. Before getting on with the review, however, it is by no means unimportant to understand how a book with such a title is related to mathematics. The fact is that its title - Facets of the Diamond - is related to the idea according to which mathematics is said to be so austere and imperious that it can be compared with a diamond. Keeping this analogy in mind, it is said that, just like a diamond, mathematics has many facets. In order to approach some of them, as it is said in the introduction, it would be necessary to think of mathematics as a cultural product of society or, in a narrower sense, as a technique mankind uses to produce culture. It is also important to note that the scope of the book is not that wide because to consider mathematics in all its aspects would be too pretentious a project to be undertaken in a single work. The book, thus, concerns only three facets: 1) Mathematics Education (p. 09-106), 2) History of Mathematics (p. 107-202) and 3) The Relations between Mathematics Education and History of Mathematics (p. 203-271).