American Mosaic Project (AMP)

The American Mosaic Project is a research initiative designed to contribute to scholarly and public understandings of what brings Americans together, what divides us (especially along racial and religious lines), and the implications of our diversity for our political and civic life. By focusing on how Americans understand the nature and consequences of diversity in their own lives and for our society as a whole, the Project tries to imagine and work toward a more tolerant, inclusive society. A longtime collaboration between the David Edelstein Family Foundation and researchers at the Department of Sociology at the University of Minnesota, the “AMP” has a track record of academic success and societal impact that is as relevant and necessary today as when the project was first launched.

Origins and History

The American Mosaic Project was launched over 25 years ago as a partnership between the Minnesota-based David Edelstein Family Foundation and researchers with the Department of Sociology at the University of Minnesota. The co-Principal Investigators on the project were then, as they are now, Penny Edgell, Joseph Gerteis, and Douglas Hartmann.

The first wave of the project, a nationally representative telephone survey conducted in 2003, measured attitudes about diversity, racial and religious identities, and discrimination. Through in-depth interviews and fieldwork across the country, we further explored the various contexts in which Americans experience diversity, focusing on religious interfaith organizations, neighborhoods, and festivals.

From 2005 to 2011, the research team published over a dozen highly cited (and some award-winning) papers in flagship venues such as American Sociological Review, Social Problems, and Sociological Theory, as well as a range of specialty journals. A second wave of the AMP survey was fielded in 2014 and resulted in a subsequent new wave of publications and numerous graduate student placements around the country. The previous waves of survey data is archived at the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) at the University of Michigan (2003, 2014) and the Association of Religion Data Archives (2003, 2014).

Current Research

The third major survey completed as part of the project on our 10-year cycle was conducted in October 2024. The survey was conducted in partnership with the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago with Professor Paul Croll (Augustana College, Iowa), a Minnesota Ph.D. and former project manager for the Project. 

Teams of current and former graduate students are working with the project PIs on initial papers and projects with research focus areas including: anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and intolerance in general; political polarization; attitudes about religion and religiosity and the role of religion in public life; understandings of race, diversity, and the American Dream.

The survey instrument was developed from previous AMP surveys, including standard items about social groups, racial attitudes, religious participation, and political opinions. More innovative and unique items have also been developed, including multifaceted questions on racial and religious identities as well as items related to newer cultural phenomena such as colorblindness, multiculturalism and diversity, and conceptions of religion and public life. The survey also features distinctive question sets related to visions of American society and culture, attitudes about citizenship and belonging, and opinions about various racial, religious, and political subgroups.