Bengali Americans

Bengali Americans
বাঙালি আমেরিকানরা
	The language spread of Bengali in the United States according to U. S. Census 2000
Total population
	375,143 (0.12% of U.S. population)
Regions with significant populations
	New York City, Washington DC, Los Angeles, SF Bay Area, Detroit
Languages
	English, Bengali
Religion
	Predominantly Islam and Hinduism; small minorities of Christianity, Buddhism
Related ethnic groups
	Bangladeshi Americans, Indian Americans

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. Bengali also classified under Bangladeshi Americans.^[3] Significant immigration of engalis 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

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