Creighton, Millie

English

Histoire sociale / Social History (E-Journal, York University)

Histoire sociale – Social History, vol. XXXVIII, no 76 (novembre-November 2005)Comptes rendus / Book Reviews 511devenus grands gardant précieusement dans leur mémoire le souvenir des SœurMonique, Madame Saumure, Mademoiselle Estelle...Marie-Claude ThifaultUniversité de HearstFUESS, Harald — Divorce in Japan: Family, Gender, and the State, 1600–2000.Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. 2004. Pp. xiv, 226.In the first extensive work in English documenting the history of divorce practicesin Japan, Harald Fuess shows how divorce is interrelated with issues and ideals ofgender, family, state, and society. Fuess presents statistical data on divorce in differ-ent regions of Japan over four centuries, from 1600 to 2000. He explores personalstories of divorce, insights revealed through popular culture, and diaries mentioningdivorce written by foreigners encountering Japan. I welcome this book as one thatprovides an essential exploration of divorce in Japan, revealing the falsity of stead-fastly held myths about traditional Japanese family relations.Japan is frequently held up, by those lamenting divorce, as a country where tradi-tionally divorce was rare, and it is often contrasted with the United States, consid-ered a country of easy divorce. I have long been aware that, as Fuess documents, therate of divorce was extremely high in Japan in the late 1800s — much higher than inthe United States. So strong is the myth that in Japan divorce was unusual and thatAmericans divorce readily, however, that students, including Japanese students,express disbelief that the divorce rate in Japan was at any time higher than in theUnited States.Fuess shows that traditionally the family was of paramount importance in Japan,but, precisely for this reason, marriage was not. In contrast to countries such as Can-ada and the United States, where the family is built around the relationship betweena married couple, in Japan the family ideal was historically constructed around thehousehold lineage. This presentation shows that divorce is not necessarily a result ofbreakdown in personal relations between two people. Fuess documents cases inwhich parents initiated a divorce against the wishes of both husband and wife.When Japan began to open up to western contact at the beginning of the Meiji Era(1868–1910), westerners were stunned by the prevalence of divorce and saw it asreflecting the low status of women in Japan. Fuess argues this was a one-sided andculturally biased view. A high divorce rate was partly the result of tolerance for trialmarriage. Since the relationship was embedded within a larger system of family andneighbourhood alliance networks, if these did not work smoothly, the couple woulddivorce and each would likely enter some other future marriage. No particularstigma attached to either of them, and there was no particular social emphasis onfemale virginity, common in North America at the time, to prevent women fromremarriage. The book reveals that, contrary to stereotypes, North American societytended much more toward the puritanical in marriage and family relationships,while a sort of pragmatism prevailed in Japan. Ironically, the historic tolerance for512 Histoire sociale / Social HistoryHistoire sociale – Social History, vol. XXXVIII, no 76 (novembre-November 2005)high divorce rates in Japan may have been the trend to emerge later in North Ameri-can societies precisely to allow more flexibility and the possibility of better workingpartnerships, while Japan, conscious of external western opinion, was introducinglaws limiting divorce. Thus, while North American society was beginning to over-come socially stigmatizing attitudes towards divorce, Japan, where this had been thecommon approach prior to criticism from North Americans, was shifting the otherway to a more strictly regimented system of marital partnerships.Fuess provides counter arguments to the idea that the high Japanese divorce ratewas necessarily negative for women. He documents the Edo Era (1600–1868) prac-tice of “divorce temples” (kakekomidera). Women wishing to flee their husbands orhusbands’ families could do so by entering such a temple and living there for a des-ignated period, usually three years. Thus there were mechanisms through whichwives could initiate divorce. In other cases, a wife who had been “returned” to hernatal family as unsatisfactory to her husband’s household was often really a wifewho initiated a divorce because of her own dissatisfaction.Although I applaud Fuess’s work in presenting these alternative views of divorce,he sometimes overstates his case. Fuess points out that women often took charge ofinitiating a divorce, but in the cases he mentions it was frequently the husband’smother — not the wife. Thus senior women as mothers gained enough power in theJapanese family system to initiate a divorce, but this power tended to be used at theexpense of other women and reveals the low power status of young brides withinfamilies, rather than uncontestedly showing female agency.Other important aspects of marriage, death, divorce, and re-marriage are dis-cussed in relationship to the Japanese family system, as is the prevailing emphasison maintaining the household lineage or ie over the emphasis on individuals whocomprised it at any given time or generation. Fuess documents the preferred patternof re-marriage in some areas for a widower to marry his deceased wife’s sister.Again, I welcomed this material because I have worked in areas of rural Japan inwhich this was a commonly preferred marriage alliance, and dealt with kin groups inwhich the adult children of the same man were the offspring of women who weresisters. As with the idea that Japanese had high divorce rates, I have had to deal withthe disbelief of students in my classes when explaining these kinship ties. Once thiswas challenged by a Japanese student in my class who proclaimed to the other stu-dents that such things have never happened in Japan.After tracing the high divorce rates in early industrial Japan, Fuess shows how theJapanese government instituted reforms attempting to deter divorce and lock mar-riages into place, to appeal to western developed countries. However, some of theselegal reforms came up against newly emerging ideas of family based on genderequality and a true sense of partnership between man and woman that also recog-nized the validity of human sexual compatibility as a basis of marriage. Thus manyJapanese intellectuals wrote against the strictness of marriage as a legal institution inthe latter half of the twentieth century. Fuess documents the rise of divorce in Japanin the 1980s and 1990s, a trend consistent with other industrialized societies ingranting individuals more control over their own lives. However, what is importantabout Fuess’s documentation of this modern rise in Japanese divorce rates is that,Histoire sociale – Social History, vol. XXXVIII, no 76 (novembre-November 2005)Comptes rendus / Book Reviews 513unlike many others who assume this is “anti-traditional”, Fuess clearly posits it as“The Return of the Divorcing Society” (p. 161) in a country with a high historicdivorce rate, not as something new for Japan. Japanese family values did not posi-tion divorce as particularly negative until Japan had increasing interface with west-ern countries like the United States, where “traditionally” there was a much lowerdivorce rate.Millie CreightonUniversity of British ColumbiaGARNOT, Benoît — Intime conviction et erreur judiciaire. Un magistrat assassin auXVIIe siècle? Dijon, Éditions universitaires de Dijon, 2004, 160 p.Ce petit livre d’histoire sociale et, surtout, judiciaire est bien plus que la simple rela-tion d’une affaire criminelle qu’a connue la Bourgogne (et marginalement leComtat-Venaissin) à l’époque de la Fronde.Certes, cet ouvrage tire d’abord son apparente raison d’être d’un épais dossierconstitué à la suite de l’assassinat, au milieu du Grand Siècle (1649), d’un magistratde la ville de Beaune, au cœur de ce qui est aujourd’hui l’un des vignobles les plusréputés, par une famille rivale également attachée à la magistrature locale.L’auteur a voulu, en quelque sorte, faire œuvre d’histoire « totale » : connu pourses précédents travaux d’histoire qualitative à partir des archives judiciaires, BenoîtGarnot confirme la possibilité qu’a l’historien de l’ancienne société d’utiliser cetype de documents pour décrire et expliquer les manières de vivre dans la France duXVIIe siècle. Relations sociales et familiales, professionnelles, univers matériel,« mentalités » comme on disait encore récemment, comportements individuels etcollectifs, tout un petit monde, reflet d’une plus large société d’Ancien Régime, estainsi passé au crible à partir d’archives judiciaires évidemment complétées pard’autres sources « d’époque » et par diverses études plus modernes, notamment destravaux d’étudiants bourguignons ou des synthèses de l’auteur en personne effec-tuées à partir de telles recherches. On pourra regretter la faiblesse de références ennotes sur certains passages.Surtout, l’intérêt de la présente étude tient dans sa partie proprement judiciaire.Sur ce point, la résolution du crime (ou l’erreur judiciaire) n’est assurément pasl’objectif premier de l’historien, contrairement peut-être à ce que laisse entendre letitre du livre. Nous retiendrons surtout que ce que nous appellerons ici un « exemplerévélateur » démontre l’intérêt que peut avoir l’historien de la justice à entreprendrece genre d’approche, tout en se persuadant des limites inhérentes à ce qui aussi ununicum.Cette « seconde », en fait première, approche du livre, permet à Garnot de rap-peler, ou confirmer, les rapports qu’entretient alors la population avec la justice deson temps : y compris chez les élites domine un thème cher à l’auteur, celui del’infrajudiciaire, et l’une de ses conséquences majeures, l’intervention « décalée »de l’appareil de justice, qui n’intervient ou que l’on ne fait intervenir qu’après

Fuess, Harald — Divorce in Japan: Family, Gender, and the State, 1600-2000

https://hssh.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/hssh/article/download/4265/3463

Fuess, Harald — Divorce in Japan: Family, Gender, and the State, 1600-2000

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Histoire sociale / Social History (E-Journal, York University)