We\u27re Not Doing Enough to End Hate Among Our Children

If we don\u27t fix prejudice when our kids are young, the next generation has no hope of a better country. Last week, a middle school student from Georgia recorded some of his classmates calling him a “terrorist” and posted it online. Presumably, the kids on his bus tormented him because of his Sikh turban. The family changed the video’s settings to private, but not before users around the world had already copied the video and reposted it. The video has since gone viral, gaining more than a million combined views from people all over the globe

Seeking justice: Sikhism in America

Simran Jeet Singh discusses Sikhism in America. A religious community that has been victim to a troubling pattern of racist violence throughout American history, Singh explains how Sikh visions for justice can help the country reclaim and reinvigorate its concept of religious freedom

Sikh Leadership: Establised Ideals and Diasporic Reality

As established in the Sikh scriptural canon, ideal leaders internalize qualities of self-sovereignty, intentional servitude, integrative creativity, authentic compassion, and perhaps most significant of all, Divine inspiration. Models of communal decision-making can also be derived from the lives of the Gurū-Prophets (1469–1708 C.E.) and the institutions they established. Though the faith recognizes no clergy class, graduates of historical seminaries often emerge as significant leaders for the Sikh nation. The community outside of the homeland, however, has experienced a lesser effort in the cultivation of leadership. With a primary focus on education, religious centers, youth camps, and retreats have played a critical role in imparting Sikh culture to the masses. While ideals are clearly articulated within the Sikh tradition, it is the application of the ideals that is necessary – Sikh leadership continually works towards these ends, and will ever seek to progress as individuals as well as a community

Conversations | GP Singh

Oak Creek Wisconsin: yet another tragic shooting, yet another mass murder, yet another horrific scene played out in the American landscape. But something sets this one apart: this one happened at a Sikh Temple. How are local Sikhs processing the tragedy

Sikh Community Activist Simran Jeet Singh: After Wisconsin Attack, I Refuse to Live in Fear

As memorials are held to remember the Sikh worshipers shot dead at a Wisconsin temple, we’re joined by Simran Jeet Singh, a Sikh community activist and doctoral candidate in religion at Columbia University. In response to Sunday’s shooting, he posted a commentary called, As a Sikh-American I Refuse to Live in Fear and Negativity. Singh writes: Although it will be important to understand what motivated the violence, this should not color the inspiration behind our own reactions. We should draw from our American and Sikh traditions by continuing to respond with love and compassion. Let us stand up together and turn the tragedy in Wisconsin into a turning point for our nation. We also speak with Don Walker, a reporter for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel covering the Sikh temple shooting

World Religions: Sikhs, Seventh-day Adventists and Mennonites

Three faith traditions as they are practiced in the United States

10 Things I Wish Everyone Knew About Sikhism

Despite being one of the world’s largest world religions, Sikhism remains one of the most unknown traditions in America. The lack of understanding has led to serious consequences, including discriminatory policies, bigoted stereotypes, traumatic school bullying and violent hate crimes. Here is a list of 10 things that the global community ought to know about its Sikh neighbors

Mulismophobia, Racialization, and Mistaken Identity: Understanding Anti-Sikh Hate Violence in Post-9/11 America

Following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, a rash of violence against minority communities spread rapidly across the United States. The hate crimes targeted people who resembled the perpetrators of the attacks, and this targeted violence helped crystallize a new racialized category in modern America: the apparently Muslim. This category incorporates people on the basis of both race and religion, and although it is not an officially recognized racial classification, Jaideep Singh argues that it has become a defining reality for those who fall under its scope. The most adversely affected have been those belonging to Muslim, Sikh, Arab, and South Asian communities

The Texas That I Love Has No Place for Bigotry

I grew up watching the Dallas Cowboys, eating barbecue and tubing down the Guadalupe River. My childhood in Texas is one that many can relate to, but for the fact that I\u27m Sikh. I wear a turban, and I have witnessed discrimination throughout my life simply because I look different. While I left Texas to pursue a career in academics and interfaith work 10 years ago, my heart has never left the state in which my family\u27s American dream was born. Through my work, I have seen minority communities struggle with being the unwarranted targets of misguided bigotry and prejudice as our nation has grappled with fear in the never-ending War on Terror

The Life of the Purātan Janamsākhī: Tracing the Earliest Memories of Gurū Nānak

This dissertation sheds new light on the Purātan Janamsākhī, the earliest available account on the founder and most important figure of the Sikh tradition – Gurū Nānak (d. 1539 CE). Scholarship on Gurū Nānak has largely dismissed the significance of this text and has overlooked the fact that, after its composition in 1588 CE, the Purātan Janamsākhī remained the most widely circulated account of Gurū Nānak’s life for two centuries. This thesis engages with the manuscripts and studies of the text to provide a life-history of the Purātan Janamsākhī, and, in arguing for a reclamation of this account, takes on a close reading of the Purātan Janamsākhī to identify how, within decades of his death, followers of Gurū Nānak remembered his life and message. This thesis situates the Purātan Janamsākhī within its historical context and compares it with some of its closest North Indian contemporaries, including other janamsākhīs composed on the life of Gurū Nānak and hagiographical writings written about religious figures from different North Indian communities. Our comparative approach allows us to identify some basic commonalities in hagiographical writing and glean aspects that distinguish the Purātan Janamsākhī from its counterparts, including Gurū Nānak’s unique interest in political critique and building a new community. This thesis, therefore, contributes significantly to our understandings of identity and community formation, to studies on hagiographical writing, and to our foundational understandings of Sikh history