An Annotation

My Project #4 Annotated Bibliography would strive to investigate the question: “How did Sufism appeal to American culture during the Vietnam War Era?”

While the following annotation will not be the most useful in answering the question, it offers an interesting takeaway that most of the sources will not provide. It shares the numerous religions that have grown in the United States over its short life. Just from observing its Table of Contents, one can see the presence of a collection of cultures, art, and outlooks on life that most often accompany religion.

Miller, Timothy. America’s Alternative Religions. Albany, State University of New York Press, 1995.

Over 43 chapters, America’s Alternative Religions categorizes various American religions by their relation to “Established Christian Alternatives”, “Contemporary Christian and Jewish Movements”, “Religions from Asia”, “Religions from the Middle East”, “African-American Freedom Movements”, “Ancient Wisdom and New Age Movements”, and “Many More…” While only one chapter focuses on “Sufism in America”, seeing the sheer number of religions that have thrived in America is important in researching the question because it speaks to the United States’ diversity, which plays a role in every scenario of a changing political climate. The most important part of “Chapter 23: Sufism in America” is its explicit statement of Sufism’s goal as having “always been deepened devotion, spiritual transformation, and, ultimately, the interiorization of the basic tenet of Islamic belief, that ‘there is no God but God’ or, in the classic Sufi interpretation, ‘Only God is the Real; Only God exists.’” (Webb, 249).