The Pluralism Project at Harvard University
Project Files
The Pluralism Project has the most comprehensive archive anywhere of the print materials of America's new immigrant religious communities: newsletters, serial publications, anniversary programs, handbooks, prayer books, calendars, and educational materials. There is nowhere else where the newsletters of a Shinto shrine, the serial publications of a Hindu temple, and the quarterly of a Buddhist temple are preserved in one place.
The Project files also include student research papers which document the changing religious landscape of America through focused case studies, as well as a variety of materials donated directly by centers, from architectural plans of a new masjid to a videotape of a temple consecration.
Currently, our archive is in the process of being reorganized; however, many scholars, researchers, and people from the media continue to make use of the Pluralism Project resources. This archive is constantly expanding as we continue to receive materials from a vast network of temples, gurdwaras, and Islamic centers across the United States. If your religious center would like to donate materials to the Pluralism Project files, please contact us.
The research papers and term papers of those who have participated in the Pluralism Project are in the Pluralism Project files at the Committee on the Study of Religion, Harvard University. Field notes and research papers have served as source materials for the writing of the On Common Ground CD-ROM text. Our city and regional studies include work on Denver, Minneapolis, Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, New Orleans, Houston, Chicago, Miami, Phoenix, Stockton, San Francisco, Oklahoma, and Pennsylvania. In addition, there are papers on various aspects of each of the religious traditions we studied – Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Jain, and Zoroastrian.
Student Research
Student researchers have written on various forms of Tibetan Buddhism; Cambodian communities in Massachusetts and Portland, Maine; Vietnamese communities in California; Korean Buddhists in New York City as well as the Korean Kwan Um School of Zen. Jane Iwamura looked at the range of Buddhist communities in the San Francisco Bay area, Duncan Williams did a study of the Buddhist communities of Portland, Oregon, and Jenny Song documented the range of some sixty-two Buddhist temples in Seattle and Tacoma. Stuart Chandler compiled a directory of Chinese Buddhist organizations in the U.S. and from his research at Hsi Lai Temple in Hacienda Heights, California, he created a booklet entitled "An Introduction to Hsi Lai Temple for its Non-Buddhist Visitors." Chloe Breyer did a study of the Vietnamese home temples in Orange County, California.
Work on the Muslim tradition included papers on African American Islam, the Ismailis, and the Sufis of America. The research of Lance Laird and Patrice Brodeur included extensive field notes on two annual conventions of the Islamic Society of North America, while Samah Jafari participated in two Muslim Youth Leadership Camps and Doris Jakobsh wrote on Islam in two different prisons. Hindu research included Emily Tucker's work on second-generation Hindu identity and Hindu summer camps. Rachel Glick wrote on a meeting of the Federation of Zoroastrians in North America and Holly Seeling wrote on the Jaina Association of North America. Maria Hibbets did a study of the Interfaith Conference of Metropolitan Washington, D.C., Chris Coble wrote on the range of Boston area urban and suburban interfaith organizations, and Marcia Beauchamp Phillips wrote on the Camp Anytown summer camps in both Arkansas and Oklahoma.
The Pluralism Project would be happy to receive and keep on file research of students and senior scholars who have done similar original research on the new religious landscape of the United States.