Immigrants to the Pure Land: The Modernization, Acculturation, and Globalization of Shin Buddhism, 1898-1941 (Pure Land Buddhist Studies): Ama, Michihiro: 9780824834388: Amazon.com: Books

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Religious acculturation is typically seen as a one-way process: The dominant religious culture imposes certain behavioral patterns, ethical standards, social values, and organizational and legal requirements onto the immigrant religious tradition. In this view, American society is the active partner in the relationship, while the newly introduced tradition is the passive recipient being changed. Michihiro Ama’s investigation of the early period of Jodo Shinshu in Hawai‘i and the United States sets a new standard for investigating the processes of religious acculturation and a radically new way of thinking about these processes.

Most studies of American religious history are conceptually grounded in a European perspectival position, regarding the U.S. as a continuation of trends and historical events that begin in Europe. Only recently have scholars begun to shift their perspectival locus to Asia. Ama’s use of materials spans the Pacific as he draws on never-before-studied archival works in Japan as well as the U.S. More important, Ama locates immigrant Jodo Shinshu at the interface of two expansionist nations. At the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries, both Japan and the U.S. were extending their realms of influence into the Pacific, where they came into contact―and eventually conflict―with one another. Jodo Shinshu in Hawai‘i and California was altered in relation to a changing Japan just as it was responding to changes in the U.S. Because Jodo Shinshu’s institutional history in the U.S. and the Pacific occurs at a contested interface, Ama defines its acculturation as a dual process of both "Japanization" and "Americanization."

Immigrants to the Pure Land explores in detail the activities of individual Shin Buddhist ministers responsible for making specific decisions regarding the practice of Jodo Shinshu in local sanghas. By focusing so closely, Ama reveals the contestation of immigrant communities faced with discrimination and exploitation in their new homes and with changing messages from Japan. The strategies employed, whether accommodation to the dominant religious culture or assertion of identity, uncover the history of an American church in the making.

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About the Author

Michihiro Ama is associate professor at Otani University, Japan.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ University of Hawaii Press
Publication date ‏ : ‎ January 31, 2011
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Print length ‏ : ‎ 328 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0824834380
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0824834388
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.45 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.13 x 0.91 x 9.33 inches
Best Sellers Rank: #11,682,156 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #7,129 in Emigration & Immigration Studies (Books)
- #16,155 in Buddhism (Books)
- #107,185 in U.S. State & Local History
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John Swindle
Fascinating if you're interested in Jodo Shinshu
Reviewed in the United States on July 17, 2020
Format: Hardcover

How did Japanese Shin Buddhism arrive in Hawaii and North America? How did it change in the encounter between different and changing cultures and in successive immigrant generations ? There's a wealth of information here and there are some interesting stories. I do wonder about the author's tendency to characterize everything in early 20th century American Buddhism that isn't in accordance with Jodo Shinshu custom as Theravadin.

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Immigrants to the Pure Land: The Modernization, Acculturation, and Globalization of Shin Buddhism, 1898-1941 (Pure Land Buddhist Studies) Hardcover – January 31, 2011

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Fascinating if you're interested in Jodo Shinshu

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Immigrants to the Pure Land: The Modernization, Acculturation, and Globalization of Shin Buddhism, 1898-1941 (Pure Land Buddhist Studies) Hardcover – January 31, 2011

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Michihiro Ama

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4.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating if you're interested in Jodo Shinshu

Fascinating if you're interested in Jodo Shinshu