Work exploring how Buddhists kept their faith in WWII detention camps wins Grawemeyer prize

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A scholar who explained how Japanese American Buddhists remained true to their faith even after being forced into U.S. detention camps during World War II has won the 2022 Grawemeyer Award in religion.

Duncan Ryuken Williams, a religion professor who directs the Shinso Ito Center for Japanese Religions and Culture at the University of Southern California, won the prize for ideas set forth in “American Sutra: A Story of Faith and Freedom in the Second World War,” his 2019 book published by Harvard University Press, according to a University of Louisville release.

After Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, the U.S. government forcibly relocated more than 125,000 people of Japanese ancestry and imprisoned them in detention camps on U.S. soil. Two-thirds were practicing Buddhists. 

Previously:Work on violence against women in politics wins Grawemeyer world order award

Some were sent to live in former fairgrounds where stables were hastily converted into living quarters. Others were crowded into dwellings of tarpaper-roofed, Army-style bunkers. Many lost their homes, farms and businesses along with their possessions, according to the U of L release.

Williams reviewed diaries and other records of their stay in the camps, learning that Buddhists continued to worship even in confinement. One family celebrated Buddha’s birthday by pouring coffee over a carrot carved in his likeness when they could not perform the traditional ritual of pouring tea over a Buddha statue.

"Their imprisonment became a way to discover freedom, a liberation that the Buddha himself attained only after embarking on a spiritual journey filled with obstacles and hardships,” Williams said in a statement.

The Buddhists’ steadfast devotion to faith in such conditions showed it was possible to be both Buddhist and American and helped launch a less sectarian form of the religion in the U.S., Williams discovered.

“Williams’ work opens the way for a discussion that values religious inclusion over exclusion,” Tyler Mayfield, who directs the Grawemeyer religion award, said in a statement. “He shows how Japanese Americans living in a time of great adversity broadened our nation’s vision of religious freedom.”

More:Economist who found school integration leads to long-term success wins Grawemeyer award

The University of Louisville and Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary jointly give the religion prize.

More Grawemeyer:Composer's gender-switching opera wins U of L's prestigious Grawemeyer music award

Recipients of next year’s Grawemeyer Awards were named this week pending formal approval by university and seminary trustees. The $100,000 prizes also honor seminal ideas in music, world order, psychology and education.

Winners will visit Louisville in April to accept their awards and give free talks on the winning ideas.

More:Researcher's groundbreaking work exploring juvenile crime wins Grawemeyer psychology award