Prema Kurien, professor of sociology, has written “Claiming Citizenship: Race, Religion, and Political Mobilization among New Americans” (Oxford University Press, 2025).

In the book, Kurien examines the political mobilization strategies of people of South Asian and Indian descent in the United States. Based on interviews with 158 leaders and activists in over 55 advocacy organizations, she argues that race, caste, religion and generational status produce diverse patterns of political activism around education, advocacy and policymaking on domestic and foreign policy issues. She also traces how immigrants reshape the host society, both conforming to aspects of that society while also transforming it to meet their unique needs.

Kurien is the author of three award-winning books, “Kaleidoscopic Ethnicity: International Migration and the Reconstruction of Community Identities in India” (Rutgers University Press, 2002),  “A Place at the Multicultural Table: The Development of an American Hinduism” (Rutgers University Press, 2007) and “Ethnic Church Meets Megachurch: Indian American Christianity in Motion” (NYU Press, 2017) as well as over 70 publications on international migration, race, ethnicity, religion and political activism. In 2024, she was recognized as a Daicoff Faculty Scholar, which honors achievements in research, scholarship and service.

Kurien is a senior research associate for the Program for the Advancement of Research on Conflict and Collaboration and a senior research associate and advisory committee member for the South Asia Center. She teaches courses on sociological theory, global community and field research and interviewing.

From the publisher:

“Large-scale international immigration has transformed the political contours of Western societies over the last few decades. The political mobilization of ethnic groups has prompted questions about nationhood, citizenship, and secularism, as well as what it means to institutionalize pluralism.

Claiming Citizenship looks at Indian Americans, currently the second-largest group of immigrants in the United States, and a group that has seen significant representation in the three most recent presidential administrations. Prema Kurien asks how Indian Americans have become a rising political force given that they have not followed the traditional, recommended model of political influence. She examines the dialectical process through which immigrants conform to the structures and cultures of the society to which they have immigrated, but also work to transform their adopted homelands to accommodate their unique needs.”