The subject of this thesis is an American Zen monastery in New York, Zen Mountain Monastery (ZMM). The study is approached through a survey of methodologies: (1) through the scholarship on American culture and religion, (2) through the sociology of the study of religious institutions and communities and (3) through a comparison with East Asian Zen monasticism. The study reveals that ZMM's monasticism: (1) is part of a systematization of Zen in America that has made Zen into a mainstream option in American society, (2) has created group practices and commitment mechanisms that put ZMM in a better position than American lay Zen centers to challenge the individualist trends of American society and spirituality and (3) is based on a conception of the self more in line with the individualism of American society than the asceticism of East Asian Zen monasticism.

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