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Americans of Bengali birth or descent
Bengali Americans (
Bengali : মার্কিন বাঙ্গালী ) are
Americans of Bengali ethnic,
cultural and
linguistic heritage and
identity . They trace their ancestry to the historic ethnolinguistic region of
Bengal region in the
Indian subcontinent , now divided in
South Asia between
Bangladesh and
West Bengal of
India . Bengali Americans are also a subgroup of modern-day
Bangladeshi Americans and
Indian Americans . Bengalis are also classified under Bangladeshi Americans.
[3] Significant immigration of Bengalis to the United States started after 1965.
Bengali Americans may refer to:
Bangladeshi Americans , Americans of
Bangladeshi descent of
Bengali Muslims . Bengali Muslims are usually classified as Bangladeshi Americans and
American Muslims .
Bengali
Indian Americans , Americans of
Indian and
Bengali Hindu descent whose ancestral origins are in
West Bengal ,
Bangladesh or erstwhile
East Bengal ,
Jharkhand ,
Purnia ,
Odisha ,
Goalpara region,
Assam , the
Barak Valley ,
Tripura ,
Nepal ,
Meghalaya ,
Rakhine state and other parts of India who are known as
Probashi Bengalis .
Bengali Hindu Americans also come from
Southeast Asia ,
Europe ,
Australia ,
New Zealand ,
South America ,
Caribbean and other parts of the world.
Culture
Many Bengali Americans participate in an annual conference, the
North American Bengali Conference , in order to celebrate their culture and discuss issues the community faces. They often form regional organizations to network and plan events.
Religions
Bengali Americans are mostly adherents of either
Islam or
Hinduism . This is manifested in the yearly celebration of
Eid ul-Fitr ,
Durga Puja and other religious celebrations. Several secular holidays are also enjoyed by the whole community, such as the Bengali new year,
Pohela Boishakh .
There are also at least two
Bengali Buddhist temples in the United States, near Washington, DC
[4] and New York City.
[5]
Notable people
Sears Tower (now Willis Tower), was designed by
Fazlur Rahman Khan . It was the tallest building in the world for over two decades.
Abhijit Banerjee - recipient of The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel
Raj Chandra Bose - Indian American Mathematician
Moni Lal Bhoumik - Indian American physicist and a bestselling author.
Arianna Afsar – former Miss California; placed in the Top 10 of the 2011 Miss America pageant
Saif Ahmad –
World Series of Poker winner
Maqsudul Alam – scientist and professor
Jalal Alamgir (d. 2011) – political scientist and professor
Mir Masoom Ali – George and Frances Ball Distinguished Professor of Statistics, Ball State University
Kali S. Banerjee – statistician and professor
[6]
Rais Bhuiyan – shooting survivor and activist
Amar Bose - founder of
Bose Corporation
Ananda Mohan Chakrabarty - scientist
Purnendu Chatterjee - industrialist
Subir Chowdhury – author and management consultant
Hansen Clarke – United States Congress in 2010, from Michigan's House of Representatives
Tarak Nath Das - anti-British Bengali Indian revolutionary and internationalist scholar
Hasan M. Elahi – interdisciplinary media artist
Rajat Gupta , former CEO of
McKinsey and Company
M. Zahid Hasan , the Eugene Higgins endowed chair professor at
Princeton University and scientist at
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory , known for ground-breaking discoveries in the quantum world
[7]
Fazle Hussain – professor of mechanical engineering,
physics , and
earth science at the
University of Houston
Abul Hussam – inventor of the
Sono arsenic filter
Norah Jones - singer and actress
Mindy Kaling - actress
Jawed Karim – co-founder of YouTube; designed key parts of
PayPal
Mohammad Ataul Karim – electrical engineer
[8]
Sumaya Kazi – founder of
Sumazi , was recognised by
BusinessWeek as one of America's Best Young Entrepreneurs
Abdus Suttar Khan – chemist and jet fuels inventor
Fazlur Rahman Khan – pioneer of modern structural engineering
Salman Khan – founder of
Khan Academy , a nonprofit educational organisation
Radha Laha - probabilist, statistician, mathematician and philanthropist
Jhumpa Lahiri - author of
The Namesake
Dipa Ma – Vipassana meditation founder in the US
Tasmin Mahfuz - American television journalist and news anchor and
Gracie award recipient for women.
Sezan Mahmud – award-winning novelist
[9] [
failed verification ]
A.K. Mozumdar - first person of South Asian descent to earn US citizenship, until it was revoked by the Supreme Court in 1924
Dhan Gopal Mukerji , first South Asian winner of Newbery Medal in 1928
Raj Mukherji , Majority Whip of the New Jersey General Assembly
Shomi Patwary – designer and music video director
Iqbal Quadir – founder of Grameenphone, Bangladesh's largest mobile phone company; heads the Legatum Center at
MIT
Kamal Quadir – entrepreneur; founded two of Bangladesh's key technology companies, CellBazaar and bKash
Anika Rahman – CEO of
Ms. Foundation for Women
Badal Roy – tabla player, percussionist, and recording artist
Reihan Salam – conservative American political commentator; blogger at The American Scene ; associate editor of
The Atlantic Monthly
Amartya Sen - recipient of The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel
Shikhee – singer; auteur of industrial band
Android Lust
Asif Azam Siddiqi – space historian; assistant professor of history at
Fordham University
M. Osman Siddique – former US ambassador
Palbasha Siddique – singer
Narasingha Sil – professor of history at
Western Oregon University
Monica Yunus – Bangladeshi-Russian-American operatic soprano
Sohla El-Waylly – American chef, restaurateur, and YouTube personality as part of
Bon Appetit ’s staff.
Samarendra Nath Roy - Indian American Mathematician
References
Africa
Americas
Asia
Europe
Eastern Northern Southern Western
Oceania See also
Americas Asia Europe Oceania