While scholars and social analysts of the early to mid 20th century predicted the rapid demise of religion and the intensification of secularization, the latter half of the 20th century instead saw the emergence of a deepening entrenchment of religion in global societies combined with an increased translocal circulation of religious ideas in post-modern global culture. The nature of contemporary American urban religious life has been radically altered since World War II, particularly following changes to the Immigration and Nationality Act in 1965. In addition, the global nature of contemporary society has promoted a transnational circulation of religious ideas so that increasingly, white Judeo-Christian Euro-Americans are chanting Tibetan mantras in US Buddhist temples while Korean-American Christians are renovating urban church buildings deserted by the children of European immigrants.

This new global context of human religiosity requires members of society who understand its nature and implications. While it is obvious that the truth claims of religious people can result in conflicts, the study of pluralism involves not only the study of conflict and diversity but also the examination and analysis of the growing number of strategies for inter-religious dialogue and relationship developing among religious communities and individuals.

The Milwaukee Pluralism Project seeks to contribute to the understanding of plural America by mapping the changing religious landscape of Milwaukee. Through the development and implementation of new courses which focus on understanding the challenges posed by the emerging religious pluralism in urban America, and it aims to teach students how to live and understand human religiosity in our increasingly religiously plural and diverse 21st century local and global communities, including our own in Milwaukee.This project seeks to provide students with opportunities through both classroom and directed individual research experience to explore the emerging religious diversity and problems of pluralism across the globe, in the US and in Milwaukee itself, and to provide a much-needed perspective on the processes and experiences of globalization that our students are undergoing in their own communities. The courses taught in conjunction with the Milwaukee Pluralism Project aim to expose undergraduates to a new body of research and writing on these issues. Research conducted by students on Milwaukee and Wisconsin religious communities will be joined to the on-going national study of US religious diversity being carried out at Harvard University. Courses and independent student research on religious pluralism are part of the larger offerings of the Department of History, Comparative Study of Religion Program, and the new Cultures & Communities program at UWM.