Book on Hinduism in United States by Prema A. Kurien

A Place at the Multicultural Table: The Development of an American Hinduism explores the Hindu American Experience and discusses the new forms, practices, and interpretations of Hinduism in United States. The author Prema A Kurien is a faculty at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University.

According to the author “The book examines the relationship between the institutionalization of Hinduism as a minority religion and the political mobilization of Hindu Indians seeking a place in multicultural America.”

From the Book Description

Drawing on the experiences of both immigrant and American-born Hindu Americans, the author demonstrates how religious ideas and practices are being imported, exported, and reshaped in the process. The result of this transnational movement is an American Hinduism--an organized, politicized, and standardized version of that which is found in India.

This first in-depth look at Hinduism in the United States and the Hindu Indian American community helps readers to understand the private devotions, practices, and beliefs of Hindu Indian Americans as well as their political mobilization and activism.

It explains the differences between immigrant and American-born Hindu Americans, how both understand their religion and their identity, and it emphasizes the importance of the social and cultural context of the United States in influencing the development of an American Hinduism.

Prema A Kurien is also the author of Kaleidoscopic Ethnicity: International Migration and the Reconstruction of Community Identities in India, which was co-winner of the American Sociological Association's 2003 Asia/Asian America book award.