Tímarit um menntarannsóknir - 01.01.2007, Page 20

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Tímarit um menntarannsóknir, 4. árgangur 2007
decisions were taken to provide mathematics
education for the benefit of society, supported
by influential individuals who knew the
capacity of mathematics education and had a
vision of its cultural and educational value.
Their arguments about fundamental reasons
for mathematics education were of great
importance. There were also moments when
no such individuals were present to promote
the teaching of mathematics and the subject
was reduced in school curricula.
Iceland was under Danish rule from the late
14th century until the 20th. The country was
gradually freeing itself from Danish subjugation,
starting in 1874 when the Icelandic Althing
(Parliament) was granted legislative power,
subject to the King’s consent. The country
acquired Home Rule in 1904, sovereignty in
1918 and the republic was established in 1944.
Cultural relationships with Denmark have
lasted still longer, appearing, for example, in
the common use of Danish textbooks in higher
education up to the 1970s.
The population of Iceland is small, and so
was its intellectual community for most of
Iceland’s 1100 years, up to the mid-1970s.
From the 1550s until 1783 there were two
cathedral schools in the country. From that
time on until 1930 there was only one upper
secondary school, a Latin School in Reykjavík
or its vicinity until 1904, and from then on
as the Reykjavík High School. University
education in mathematics had to be sought
abroad, mainly in Copenhagen, until a
department of engineering was established at
the University of Iceland in the 1940s, when
World War II forced all connection to Denmark
to be broken.
The mathematical community was still
smaller. In the whole of the 19th century
there was only one Icelandic mathematician,
Björn Gunnlaugsson, whose work as teacher
and land surveyor was an admirable and
unique achievement. Dr. Ólafur Daníelsson
was Björn Gunnlaugsson’s successor in the
20th century, being a pupil of his grandson.
Dr Ólafur Daníelsson’s influence on Icelandic
mathematics education through his textbooks
persisted for more than six decades. After
his time, his pupil, Guðmundur Arnlaugsson,
became the most influential person in
mathematics education in the second half of
the 20th century, and together with a colleague,
he took the lead in school mathematics reform
activities in the late 1960s. Thus there was a
long-standing tradition of individual authority
in the field of mathematics education.
The impact of the presence or absence of
influential individuals versus official reasons
for crucial transformation of mathematics
education in Iceland may be summarized as
follows:
ü An unknown 13th century author
translated the treatise Algorismus
from the Latin hexameter Carmen
de Algorismo by Alexander de Villa
Dei, into the Norse language, spoken
in Iceland. One could suggest that
those who financed and worked out
the translation had utilitarian aspects
in mind, to facilitate ecclesiastical
calculations, but were also following
cultural trends in Europe and adjusting
them to Icelandic culture which was
developing its characteristics. This
treatise proved to be a leitmotiv for
scholars through the centuries. It was
the part of the world mathematical
heritage that was known and pursued
in Iceland, much more so than Euclid’s
Elements, which are only sporadically
mentioned in historical documents.
ü In 1585, Bishop Guðbrandur Þorláks-
son, being the most powerful person
in the country, made a map of Iceland
based on his scientific knowledge, but
also for utilitarian aspects, that a correct
map would provide Icelanders with
safer trade and sailing on which contact
with European culture depended. In his
work, the bishop kept up with the most
recent scientific achievements of his
time in the world, a new model of the
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