Jason Luckerhoff

Jason Luckerhoff is a full professor in Communication and Culture at the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières, director of the journal Minorités linguistiques et société, co-director of the Culture et publics collection at the Presses de l’Université du Québec and director of the Consortium national d’expertise en inclusion sociale. 

He is also Chair of the Advisory Committee of the Publica Coalition, a strategic partnership created in the spring of 2017 by Érudit and Public Knowledge Project (PKP) dedicated to advancing the dissemination of research and scholarly publishing in the fields of humanities, social sciences and arts and literature, in both Canada and the world. The creation of Publica Coalition, a Canadian initiative, is part of an international movement to redefine the balance of power in order to support the free flow of knowledge in the context of transition to open access, and the development of research perspectives in the humanities and social sciences. 

Jason Luckerhoff founded and edited the journals Approches inductives (with François Guillemette) and Enjeux et société (with Normand Labrie and François Guillemette) from 2012 to 2021. He was section head and director of the Master’s and Ph.D. programs in communications at the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières. Jason worked for the Planning Council of a French-language university in Ontario (2017-2018) before being seconded as vice-rector, Program and Knowledge Development, to the University of French Ontario in Toronto for one year (2019-2020). Afterwards, he worked with various organizations that contribute to the vitality and sustainability of the Canadian Francophonie, such as the ACUFC, the RCCFC and the AUF. 

As a Scholar, and then as vice-chair of the board of directors and president of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation’s Alumni Network, Jason has been an ambassador for bilingualism for our organization. He was also a member of the Advisory Committee of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, where the issue of language rights was examined.

He holds a Bachelor's degree in Social Communication from the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières (2003), a Master's degree in Public Communication from Université Laval (2006) and a Ph.D. in Communication and Education from Université Laval (2011). 

He is the recipient of scholarships for excellence from the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation, the Laval University Foundation, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), the Fonds québécois de recherche sur la société et la culture (FQRSC), Desjardins, and the Faculty of Arts at Université Laval.

Experience as a Trudeau Scholar

As the great scientific popularizer Daniel Jacobi remarked, writing for the general public or even just for non-specialists always generates debates and polemics. Is it possible to popularize knowledge without impoverishing, simplifying, distorting or even degrading it? Can we make learned discourse accessible? Or is it fated to remain outside the grasp of non-specialists? The Trudeau Foundation does not offer its scholars ready-made answers to these questions. Rather, it advocates productive dialogue between academics and decision-makers in the worlds of arts, business, public administration and the liberal professions, as well as the volunteer and community sectors. It allows scholars to discover that popularized discourse is neither autonomous nor independent from the learned discourse produced for academic peers. At all Foundation events, the scholar is in the centre of a heterogeneous field of discourse and opposing trends.

My four years as a 2006 Foundation scholar gave me the opportunity to discuss my work with professor-researchers (fellows), scholars from various disciplines and mentors with a wealth of experience to share. My close relationship with my mentor gave me the chance to put greater planning into my projects. The annual travel stipend allowed me to study at the Université d'Avignon for one session, work on my thesis at the Louvre Museum, and present my research results in Québec, elsewhere in Canada and in several European countries. The Trudeau Foundation scholarship offered me an experience that went far beyond financial support. Besides supporting me through my doctoral degree, my experience as a Trudeau scholar changed my life.