Unit featuring a case study based on American Sutra by Duncan Ryūken Williams, explores how religion, race, and identity intersected in the experience of Japanese American Buddhists during WWII internment. The case study, "American Buddhism Behind Barbed Wire: Japanese American Buddhists during WWII internment", focuses on what happened to over 120,000 Japanese Americans—most of them U.S. citizens—were forcibly incarcerated under Executive Order 9066 after the attacks on Pearl Harbor. That policy was driven less by security than by racial prejudice and religious bias. Buddhism, central to Japanese American identity, was viewed with suspicion compared to Protestant Christianity, and Buddhist priests were often targeted first for arrest. In the camps, Buddhist practices were suppressed, stigmatized, or pressured toward conversion, yet the tradition adapted through lay leadership, English-language services, and youth groups. Out of this hardship emerged a distinctly American Buddhism—more democratic, lay-led, and resilient—raising enduring constitutional questions about religious freedom, minority rights, and the impact of race on how religions are perceived in the United States.
A worldview is a comprehensive set of beliefs and assumptions that an individual uses to understand and interpret the world and their place in it. It influences how we perceive reality, makes decisions, and interact with others. A worldview is shaped by factors like culture, education, religion, and personal experiences. This lesson, inspired by our visit to Shofuso, features a graphic organizer for site visits and experiential learning that invites students to look for visual and tangible elements of a worldview as expressed in built spaces and environments.
There are many potential future connections to other Religious Studies and Philosophy course, such as units on East Asian Buddhism, Indigenous East Asian traditions like Shintoism, and units on Existentialism and Phenomenology in Philosophy courses.