Join Carolyn Chen, the author of this semester's MIT Reads selection, in dialog with an MIT student moderator.

Work Pray Code: When Work Becomes Religion in Silicon Valley explores how tech companies are bringing religion into the workplace in ways that are replacing traditional places of worship, blurring the line between work and religion, and transforming the very nature of spiritual experience in modern life. Author Carolyn Chen spent more than five years in Silicon Valley, conducting a wealth of in-depth interviews and gaining unprecedented access to the best and brightest of the tech world. The result is a penetrating account of how work now satisfies workers’ needs for belonging, identity, purpose, and transcendence that religion once met. Chen argues that tech firms are offering spiritual care to make their employees more productive, but that our religious traditions, communities, and public sphere are paying the price. Work Pray Code reveals what can happen when work becomes religion, and when the workplace becomes the institution that shapes our souls.

Carolyn Chen is an Associate Professor at the University of California Berkley with a focus on the Asian American experience.  She was Associate Professor of Sociology and Asian American Studies at Northwestern University, where she served as Director of the Asian American Studies Program. Professor Chen’s research focuses on two areas: work and religion in contemporary America, and religion, race, and ethnicity, especially among Asian Americans. She is author of Getting Saved in America: Taiwanese Immigration and Religious Experience (Princeton 2008) and co-editor of Sustaining Faith Traditions: Race, Ethnicity and Religion among the Latino and Asian-American Second Generation (NYU 2012).

This event is free and open to all, but you must pre-register.

• Copies of the book will be available to purchase at the in-person event.
• For virtual registrants: URL will be emailed approximately one month before the event.

Accessibility: Our events are enriched by your presence and we are committed to making them accessible. Please email ce-lib@mit.edu by April 21 to request an accommodation.

Discussion event: MIT community members are invited to join us for a small group discussion of Work Pray Code on Thursday, May 4, 12-1pm, in The Nexus at Hayden Library. Registration is required and lunch will be provided.

This semester's MIT Reads book was chosen by the Addir Interfaith Fellows Program and the MIT Libraries.