Earlier, I blogged about some maps of the number of religious houses of worship by state – 702 Mandirs, 89 Jain temples, 236 Sikh gurdwaras, 2039 Buddhist temples, and 1855 Islamic masjids / mosques. In response readers asked for maps of the numbers of religious adherents as a percentage of the population. I thought this would be tough, so I told the monkeys in the basement of our bunker that they wouldn’t eat until they brought me such information. I was worried that I would have a bunch of starving monkeys on our hands, but lo and behold – they came through. Below the fold is a map of Muslims as a percentage of residents by county across the entire USAA map of Muslims as a percentage of residents by county across the entire USA. Click on it if you want a larger version.
There are only a handful of counties with between 2 and 10% muslims – Queens (obviously), but also one in Michigan, one in Ohio, one in Delaware, one in Virginia and a few in Georgia. Not at all where I expected them to be. None of them are in California at all, but both CA and upstate NY have a number of counties with between .8 – 2.1% muslim populations, as do Michigan, Jersey, Texas, and several other states. Heck, even Wyoming and Colorado meet that threshold in a few places!
Unfortunately, no such maps are readily available for Hindus, Jains, Sikhs or Buddhists, probably because they’re too small a section of the population, and too dispersed, to readily show up.
UPDATE:
There are many other such maps, all of which concern “mainstream” Abrahamic faiths. Here’s some background about them:
The U.S. Census Bureau, due to issues related to the separation of church and state, does not ask questions related to faith or religion on the decennial census. Accordingly, there are few sources of comprehensive data on church membership and religious affiliation for the United States. Perhaps the leading organization to address this gap is the Glenmary Research Center, which publishes Religious Congregations and Membership in the United States, 2000. The following series of county-level choropleth maps, which reveals the distribution of the larger and more regionally concentrated church bodies, draws on this resource
(Via Marginal Revolution)
What was the point of this post? The map is probably 4 years old. What are you trying to prove? This is just so, 4 years later, we can know where all the Muslims are, based on 2000 census data?
Not to be anal retentive, but since you did call the other respective houses of worship by their actual names… could you refer to Islamic centers of worship as Masjids, and not mosques. I, along with others (i’m sure of it), completely despise it when people use that word.
It’s Masjid. It makes no sense that you call the other temples by their names and yet you use the bastardized english version for Muslim centers of worship.
And why aren’t there any maps of Hindus, Jains, Sikhs or Buddhists? Because they’re currently not on the FBI’s most wanted shitlist.
Oh what’s that? I think I hear the fire department ringing the alarm…
You’re reacting to the title of the post, which is a reference. The last post on this topic was called “Where the Mandirs are” which was a reference to “where the girls are” which has become a generic “where the XXX are”. You’ve read enough of my posts to know that I’m not anti-Muslim. I’ve changed the reference, as per your suggestion.
The purpose of the post is in the first two sentences. I was asked, earlier, for any data on the percentage of adherents to different faiths in different parts of the country. This is the only data I could find.
Why are the data old? Because that’s the date of the last survey and I just discovered the data now. Let me know if you know of more contemporary information.
I appreciate the change you made. Thank you Ennis.
It seems like there may just be bloggers among us that hold common courtesy and respect prioritized when they write. I applaud you for keeping it cool.
Base on my experiences, I do wonder if there is a bit of a skew to the data. For instance, Wood County, Ohio is actually home to the largest mosque in North America. However, Toledo (where I’d say most Muslims live in NW Ohio) is in Lucas County to the north. Not sure if the data is by where the mosque is or where the people are. Either way, this is much more indicative of where one would expect tensions as racial/ethnic/religious tensions usually occur due to a percentage threshold being met.
It’s where the people are, as a percentage of the local population. The earlier maps were where the houses of worship are.
In India it is my understanding that Mosques are called ‘Masjids’.
Aizaz : Not everyone on this planet is out to get the Muslims. But then again, I’m a Zionist Neo-Con ultra right Texan anti-Islamic VHP supporting blah bhal blah bhaaaaahhhhh!!!!!
Oh God, I pray, please shower us with more religions…. we need more conflict. This is not enough…. MORE PLEASE, GAWD.
I have never heard Muslims objecting to their house of worship being called a mosque before, in fact all my Muslim friends refer to it as mosque without any problem. I genuinely have never heard of this before, and I have lots of Muslim friends who call the mosque a mosque. Muslims in the media also call it mosque.
aizar akram
I think the reason that hindu, sikhs, jains and buddhists are not on the FBI shitlist is cause you don’t hear too many leaders there preaching “Death to America” at those places of worship
I put the word mosques back in after I got some private communications from people who didn’t know what a masjid was, now they’re side by side.
Which is why, of course, they have a map of Methodists! And Amish! You know the FBI is tracking the Amish!
Did you RTFA?
as far as i know jains dont call it jain temple either
^ yeah, its called a dehraser
Private communications? So basically, someone doesn’t want to admit how stupid they are?
I’d expect a little more from the SM readership… because you know, everyone who comments on this site has a ph.d from an ivy and commands a fortune 500.
If you don’t know what a masjid is, there’s a friendly internet tool called google.com– or even better, dictionary.com
Here, let me help you folks out:
Dictionary.com’s definition of Masjid.
I find it hard to believe that the folks who post here can pull CIA facts and all sorts of asinine statistics out of thin air, yet can’t “figure out” what the word Masjid means.
Pretty pathetic if you ask me. Sounds like some folks either don’t care to know or simply don’t want to know what it means.
Tsk tsk. Ignorant, acting-too-smart/wiseass-for-their-own-good sepia mutiny readers. I can’t get enough of this crowd.
Manish– I know you’re reading this. I’m seriously rolling my eyes right now.
In fact, I think I’ll make a video of it and email it to you.
I love this internets thing– the facade of security & demonstrating your e-intelligence saves the day once again…
Another Angry Pakistani writes Angry Posts About His Anger. And elsewhere in the news, more Anger from other Angry Muslims, with some Rage and Anger too.
Aizaz,
I’m glad that people like you are still around on SM. I know exactly what a masjid is, because I was exposed to it as a result of choices I’ve made. I’d just hope you can bear with other folks who want to learn, and go off on the people who don’t–I say this, because i frequently fuck up and start yelling at people who would be open to engagement and learning and change in their behaviors/attitudes. As opposed to those who wouldn’t (i.e. three quarters of the people on this blog who think they know how to solve “the terrorism problem”) who you should scream at as much as possible 🙂
In that vein, I don’t think Ennis necessarily deserves the brunt of your anger. But I would take issue with this statement:
“Unfortunately, no such maps are readily available for Hindus, Jains, Sikhs or Buddhists, probably because theyÂ’re too small a section of the population, and too dispersed, to readily show up.”
It’s a pretty loaded assumption, given the way Islam is approached in the United States today and has been in Euro- and settler-civilization for hundreds of years. I mean, analogously, there’s a history behind why we all use the term “South Asian” rather than some perfectly reasonable equivalent like “subcontinental” or some other thing that was never invented (well, until desi).
Also, isn’t gurudwara spelled as such? or does it have multiple spellings in english?
And what’s a mandir? 😉
Someone else,
Both spellings (and pronunciations) are valid.
Someone really needs to give aizaz akram a quaalude. If it weren’t for Islamic “expantion” there wouldn’t be a word like “mosque,” which is historically related to “masjid.” Dude should learn to read an OED and reconcile the fact that sounds change. I don’t hear the Pennsylvania Dutch demanding their churches be called “kerk”! What about Hindus? “mandir” is SO north Indian. I prefer “koovil”.
someone else is cool. if i said aizaz was cool i’d be biased.
i’m enthusiastically waiting for the usual commenters to get on with their CIA stats website open and economic books side by side, spending hours on end to create a witty essay written in an effort to convince us that they actually have the ratio of muslims vs hindus vs jains living in “arbitrary small town, mid america” memorized by heart. Complete with the usual “go throw a hissy fit over cartoons” cliche offensive.
of course, I probably just ruined all chances of an amusing afternoon for myself by calling them out mid-paragraph 3
Why the rush to see a conspiracy in which faiths have maps? Why not take a look at the list of maps and see what unites them? As ME-L pointed out there are maps of Mormons, maps of Mennonites, maps of Pentecostals, etc. The only two non-Christian faiths included are Muslims and Jews, which are both Abrahamic and both the largest non-Christian faiths in the US.
I’m as clear as I can be– it’s sad that most of you who attack me won’t even reveal yourselves (again, word up to the security shield of the internet, mr./ms. wise ass sepia mutiny reader), whereas… well myself, I’ve got nothing else to prove except my pride and my ability to prove a point. That’s all.
The doctor sahib prescribing me a quaalude should also realize that the word mosque has, historically, had a negative connotation, often which is questioned. Therefore, it might be better to err on the good side and use the safe “masjid,” which is accepted amongst Muslims.
It’s funny– media has accepted the words: al-qaeda, islamist, jihad and is so quick to use them– yet they can’t respect the fact that we call our places of worship Masjid and not mosque. But, hey, let’s use mosque anyway!! Those dirty mozzlems shouldn’t get no respect!
Also, I’m not exactly ‘angry’ at anyone. I guess if someone truly didn’t know (sad that they had to rely on Sepia Mutiny to acquire this info, and not the rest of the vast internet) it is Ennis’ responsibility to provide the information. The compromise is accepted.
Thanks for the positive comments Someone Else, and Saira, you’re my homegirl =D…
The rest of you, well… keep doing what you do. Being that pain in your ass is what I’m here for.
Aizaz, could you enlighten me about the negative connotation of the word ‘Mosque’ or pass some references? I am really curious, since all these years, I have never heard of this issue – for me, it was just the word for masjid in English.
Here you are
Pretty basic search. Most of those links discuss the questionable background of the word. So why bother calling it mosque when you could call it Masjid and make it easy?
I grew up in a predominantly Jewish neighborhood in NY and I say Synagogue whenever I refer to a Jewish temple; I got used to the proper term. It’s just [oh shit, here it goes!!] a bit more P.C. to use Masjid instead of mosque.
Plus, I am sure you will gain a bit more respect from your audience if they hear you drop the former.
In The Latest Update, We hear Reports that an Angry Aizaz is Still Angry and Very Annoyed and So He Shouts And Insults Everyone Randomly – More Anger as Soon As We have Confirmation of that unfocussed Rage and Anger and Sulking Scattergun Accusations and Anger
In Further News on Anger Managament the Angry Man Says
To Which a Random cross Section of BeMuSeD Wise Ass Sepia Mutiny Readers say:
“You’re not a pain in my ass – you are just a pain and an ass”
BeanieBoi,
That’s fair–I just work on the assumption that most “studies” of Muslims these days are along the lines of the FBI counting mosques until proved otherwise (which you did). It’s still interesting, though, even having looked at the maps, to try and figure out why some communities get mapped and others don’t:
From wikipedia:
# of Hindus in the United States: 1.48 million # of Muslims in the United States: 1.56 million # of Church of the Nazarene members in the United States: 0.62 million # of Mennonites in the United States: 0.32 million
So maybe the assumption is correct that Hindus are too dispersed–just saying it’s an easy out.
In this day and age, when kids are getting smarter by the day (especially those on sepia mutiny), it’s sad to see so many of the “mutineers” result to personal attacks.
And I have to say, those are pretty lame ass personal attacks. What’s with caps lock spazzing?
Making up for the lack of argument by way of insult is adding to the fact you’re simply not man enough… posting under an alias, pretty sad. If sitemeter didn’t update so fast, I would’ve loved to score your IP address. I’d love to find out who you really are.
I grew up in a predominantly Jewish neighborhood in NY and I say Synagogue whenever I refer to a Jewish temple;
traditionally the reform say temple, the non-reform (conservative, orthodox) will say synagogue. the use of the term “temple” by reform jews was to show that they harkened back to the pre-rabbnical days when jews worshipped in temples. conservative and orthodox do not like the world temple. who is right?
i don’t know if mosque has a negative connotation, but your confusion about the term “synagogue” and “temple” makes one wonder about your authority to speak on this topic because of a deep breadth of knowledge.
i’m enthusiastically waiting for the usual commenters to get on with their CIA stats website open and economic books side by side, spending hours on end to create a witty essay written in an effort to convince us that they actually have the ratio of muslims vs hindus vs jains living in “arbitrary small town, mid america” memorized by heart. Complete with the usual “go throw a hissy fit over cartoons” cliche offensive.
if this is directed at me
1) i read a lot, i don’t need to go look shit up a lot of the time.
2) if you know how to search, it really doesn’t take hours (you would know if you were a looker-uper, try it, it might improve the discourse).
3) what said brown people were nerds? i get shat on regularly here for trying to bring in facts because that’s “showing off.” what is this? high school?
Aizaz, from all the links you provided, most of them confirm that the word mosque is not derived from the Spanish word for mosquito . I don’t get it. You’ve either not read the links you posted, or you’re hoping that no one will actually read the links you provided. One of the links which had a slightly detailed explaination is here: Islam Today Anyway, i think you’re just ranting and raving unnecesarily.
I just saw on the news that on Egypt/Isreal border there was a terrorist attack and they are reported that already there are 22 dead. I’ll give you one guess what the religon of these attackers were.
If there are any so-called moderate muslims on this board, I hope they speak out about this.
what is with all the hating today?
dear pearl jam, just because there is a terrorist attack out there, does not mean that the “moderate” muslims have to sit there and speak out against it every time…i for one am sick of proving my “moderateness” to people who are too stubborn to accept that every religion has its extremists. We don’t ask jews to speak out against conservatives, or Hindus to denounce the VHP, so stop asking us to appease ur stupid demands.
PearlJamFam
I’m a moderate muslim.. Oh but guess what, I’m not Egyptian. I’m not Arab either! gasp I will not for one second step into this trap of discussing recent Arab history and politics in order to explain this situation and I find it utterly pathetic for you to have termed your statement to allude that moderate muslims must hold an explanation for muslim egyptian terrorists. I know for sure that you know the underlying schematics between the muslims and jews living in arab countries. Go read up on it, it doesn’t take a muslim to figure out whats going on there.
Razib,
Don’t give yourself so much importance. It was simply a mockery of what 95% of the commenters on this site do. Take it with a grain of salt and laugh with me, buddy.
Being from a sikh background, I have more then spoken out against the idiots in my background.
And you can’t compare conservative jews, or right wing hindu’s to extremists muslims. There are many who will agree with me.
I can’t see too many people worried about losing there forward culture in the west to right wing jews or hindu’s
Hi Derick,
Maybe I wasn’t clear enough: “Most of those links discuss the questionable background of the word.”
I never once confirmed or sided with any of the theories/thoughts revolving around the word, but since it is perceived to be a word with, again, a questionable background, why choose to use a term that might possibly offend someone?
Here’s a notion: why not use the one that makes the listener provide an additional shred of respect for you?
Hi Kasim,
I actually speak a couple of the languages you mentioned to a certain extent (among others), so I’m a bit familiar with linguistics and their ability to share sounds. Also, as far as sounds and harmonics go in general, I know a thing or two about how some of it works too, so again, I’m not completely clueless on the subject you’re bringing forth.
Whether or not Mosque is an extension of the word Masjid having traveled through the magical space-time contiuum (I know my SM people are true star trek geeks! it sooooo obvious!!), the fact still remains:
Although Mosque has been around and (ab)used for quite some time, the most proper, p.c. usage of the Muslim house of worship is, drum-roll please:
Masjid
End of story.
Who wants to test my rocket launcher?
A rose by any other name might just be a turnip. Your own fart is a rose by any other name. This blog is getting emboiled in culture wars over semantics; just like the debate of calling ‘it’ the “Christmas Tree” or the “Holiday Tree”. I dont think, a rose becomes a turnip. For me the intent of the article and its content never casted any aspersions knowingly or unknowingly on anyone. Having grown up in Lucknow, which has a sizeable Muslim population (would be marked in black if a similar map is drawn) and boasts of being the home of a sizeable Urdu speaking educated population in India, I do not recall any embarassing situation by referring to a Masjid / Musjid as a Mosque.
Kush, you are the man.
re: the p.s.
Yea, I try not to tout myself or my personality so much (I mean, I don’t exactly have an ivy degree, so I haven’t exactly earned the right).
But to a certain degree, I am the one and only aizaz akram, the baller, le beau gosse, el papi chulo, dalal ji, whatever you want to call it. XD
hi razib
I was actually wondering where you were. I knew you’d chime in at any moment.
In fact, you are a bit off. The word Shule is used with the orthodox/conservative crowd. Synagogue is more universally accepted, and temple is used as a last resort, or more with the reform crowd. Since both Temples have since been destroyed, a significant portion of Jewish folks actually dislike using the term.
You can go ahead and question my authority. Everyone is entitled to an opinion after all– but your sly personal attack has not gone unnoticed.
The contempt you hold for your former muslim brother/sisterhood is clearly prevalent throughout the majority of your posts; it’s easily recognizable– therefore I knew you’d come marching in soon, especially wherever a muslim “running his mouth (because all muslims are stupid)” may be.
Please, next time though, come in armed with your facts a tad bit stronger.
Asalaamualaikum
Aizaz Akram
Can you feel the love?
Yo Siddhartha M,
In response to all the hating, I’m really not sure. If I had a penny for every time I read some sort of racist/prejudiced undertoned message about any religion on this website, I could stack more illicit rupees than musharraf himself!
I’m just a brown kid trying to speak his mind.
Why they gotta stick me for my words?? I really have no idea.
Back to work XD
So some people are upset about the right name for what the muslim house of worship is called.
I may be wrong, but are there not issues in the muslim community right now in the year 2006 that they should be a little more worried about.
In fact, you are a bit off. The word Shule is used with the orthodox/conservative crowd. Synagogue is more universally accepted, and temple is used as a last resort, or more with the reform crowd. Since both Temples have since been destroyed, a significant portion of Jewish folks actually dislike using the term.
speaking of facts, how does this disagree with what i’m saying? reform tend like the term (more or less), and others do not. who are the true jews? do you get to decide that conservative/orthodox are the “real jews”? FYI, reform jews are the largest american group.
as for my dislike of muslims, well, yeah, in general i dislike most muslims. shrug i don’t dislike taz, nor do i dislike my friend aziz poonawalla, or najeeb, or zack ajmal, but the reality is that most muslims throughout the world tend to agree on a form of islam that isn’t to my liking. but, i would offer the difference between myself and you is that your rabble rousing is all bluster with facts being thin on the group.
PearlJamFan. I have spoken out against them, as have many other moderate muslims. I just choose not to do so right now because if you haven’t yet heard of muslims speaking out against terrorits you must intentionally have your eyes and ears closed. I have better things to do than uselessly attempt to pry them open.
PJF – a semblance of staying on topic please? This isn’t a terrorism thread.
“Someone Else” – glad to see you back 🙂
You shouldn’t jump to assumptions and then need BeanieBoi or anybody else to correct you. Why do you see the hand of the “man” in everything? Was it the CIA/FBI who caused Oprah to talk about the Koran on her show?
The survey is primarily done for Christian faiths, hence Church of the Nazarene and Mennonites. As for the number of Muslims, there’s a big debate about this, with numbers ranging from 1.1 million (usually the lowest I see is 2 million) to 7 million. So Muslims get included b/c they’re likely more Muslims than anybody else except Christians and Jews, and because they’re similar to Christians and Jews who are already being counted.
Aizaz – honestly, you’re the first person I’ve met to object to the word Mosque. For example, CAIR consistently uses mosque unless the temple is called “Masjid such and such”. They have a whole section on “The Mosque in America.” One of your links, from MuslimHeritage, calls it a mosque throughout. I’m happy to use both words, but I’m not convinced given this evidence, that this is a term offensive to the majority of Muslims.
Hi PearlJamFan,
I agree with you. Muslims have obviously neglected the problems we face today as a collective community, but I’ve always thought that we can never come to terms with the problems simply because a lot of us just aren’t like the folks who comment on sepia mutiny: bright and sharp, with degrees from harvard, yale and princeton.
The lack of solid education has discouraged many of us from speaking our minds with sound logic and reasoning. Those who have actually managed to score some wisdom/intelligence have defected or have shrunk underneath the pressure of so many strongminded, well-spoken individuals who work against us, i.e. statistic-finding, theory-displacing, truly hate-filled SM commenters (note: aizaz akram does not fall in this group– he didn’t graduate from an ivy, ohh myyyy GOD!)
Just so you know, I paid attention in class, barely enough, but I did. And now I’m here, causing a ruckus on the sepia mutiny boards, giving folks a headache because,gasp, there ARE muslims who just might be a little smart!
Anyway, this truly sad lapse of education (spread over hundreds of years now) has lead to a rather large group of individuals driven by an idealogy twisted beyond words and not modern methods of tuition.
We could go into a fairly in-depth discussion about this, but I can just sum it up here:
Muslims aren’t the smartest bunch in the lot. Really. I’m sure you know this though. Turn on the news. Look at what’s happening in Israel & the contested territories… Iraq, Iran, and Pakistan.
This is partly because of the rather greedy “leaders,” state controllers and those in high positions removing power to the people and running their mouths in parallel to their personal agendas.
We’re not all stupid. It’s just hard rounding a bunch of us up, committed to the cause of fixing things.
Sadly, things may never get better in my lifetime. I hope my kids, if I ever have any, get to see brighter days.
Satsriakal bro.
aizazi
Switching away from entymology ;), were any of you surprised to see the demographic patterns? I sure was. I thought there would be more of a coastal concentration. I guess even if there are large populations of Muslims on the coasts, they’re embedded in even larger populations of non-Muslims, and so they get washed out on a percentage basis.
aizaz — you’re quite refreshing.
Aizaz- I think the problem stems from what appears to be your hyper-PC nitpicking of an otherwise moot point. Come on now! My name, if I were a “good muslim” would be spelled with a “q”. But my mother’s tongue, Tamil, doesn’t have post-velar places of articulation, hence the “k”. Wow! How offensive. What I meant by “historically related” is that “mosque” comes from (through processes of historical linguistics) “masjid”. Ta-da! That’s how language works! I’d suggest picking up any basic textbook on linguistics (check your local Borders) to learn about how sounds change. It just so happens that the word, in English, was probaly borrowed from Spanish, through French which showed the phonological changes.
Ennis–
Well, you learn something new everyday.
I call it a masjid, and to hear a non-muslim say the same thing, as little as it may seem, makes a world of a difference.
It’s the little things that matter bro.
The good muslim folks these days are a little low on the “getting respect side.” Those considering themselves as Muslims and committing the acts of terrorism we see on t.v./the web have created quite the problem for us, therefore any respect, whether large or small, makes a positive difference.
I hold nothing against you, personally. Just so you know, there was never any ill-intent in my posts. I sorry to say I can’t say the same about other folks here.
-aizazi
Aizaz, I would specify further. It’s not that they are all stupid – it’s more likely that they are, as a majority (do not include the oil rich Arab tycoons) poor. The all encompassing poverty leaves little opportunity for education, thus I would say the majority of muslims around the world are not educated, not ‘not smart’. Otherwise, well said.
I just realized I’m a little bit ashamed of sharing my taste in music with PearlJamFan.