Family Sacrifices provides a comprehensive, sociological portrait of Chinese Americans’ most cherished values, practices, and ethics, ultimately illuminating why this ethnic group is the most nonreligious (52%) in the United States. Though unaffiliated, Chinese Americans adhere to the moral system of familism, a transpacific lived tradition rooted in Chinese Popular Religion and Confucianism, which prioritizes family above other commitments. Hybridizing their Chinese and American sensibilities, Chinese Americans employ familism as the primary narrative for constructing meaning, identity, and b ... More

Family Sacrifices provides a comprehensive, sociological portrait of Chinese Americans’ most cherished values, practices, and ethics, ultimately illuminating why this ethnic group is the most nonreligious (52%) in the United States. Though unaffiliated, Chinese Americans adhere to the moral system of familism, a transpacific lived tradition rooted in Chinese Popular Religion and Confucianism, which prioritizes family above other commitments. Hybridizing their Chinese and American sensibilities, Chinese Americans employ familism as the primary narrative for constructing meaning, identity, and belonging. Research on the religiously unaffiliated in the U.S. focuses on nonbelief and nonbelonging. Yet the spiritual and ethical systems of China place more emphasis on ritual and virtue. To address this gap in understanding non-Western moral systems, Family Sacrifices employs the new theoretical concept of liyi, translated as “ritual propriety and righteous relations.” Reappropriated from its original Chinese usage, liyi is a needed breakthrough for understanding Chinese religiosity and the emergence of religious “nones” in the United States. Family Sacrifices is the first book based on national survey data on Asian American religious practices and a seminal text on the fastest-growing racial group in the United States. At the intersection of Asian American studies, sociology of religion, and religious studies, it is a much needed text for anyone working with Chinese Americans and the unaffiliated.