Understanding Inclusion Across the Pond

Jonathan Larson, assistant professor of education, was recently awarded a $6,500 Franklin Research Grant from the American Philosophical Society to conduct research in Brussels as part of a project titled “The Ambiguity of Inclusion: The Power and Limits of a Diversity Framework in the European Union.”

Founded in 1743 by Benjamin Franklin, the American Philosophical Society, is the oldest learned society in the United States. Its Franklin Grant program was established in 1933 to provide scholars with small grants that support the cost of research leading to publication in all areas of knowledge.

This project is a small slice of Larson's larger interest in understanding how institutions in the EU educate and prepare students to create a more inclusive society. His research looks at how institutions of the EU work to influence education practices across member states even though it does not have explicit legislative authority to do so. 

This grant will fund research that looks at the variety of definitions of “inclusion” used in the EU and how this ambiguity in meaning might impact policymaking. Larson explains, “The ambiguity might be productive because ‘inclusion’ has not been a contentious word like it has become in the US, but I also expect that there are costs to not having a shared definition.”

While in Brussels, Larson will conduct interviews and observations complemented with archival research. “After developing the project largely from text analysis at a distance over the past four years, I am very excited for this time to do the core of what I have been trained to do as an anthropologist of education, including continuing to stretch my French,” Larson says.