著者

小尾 章子

出版者

日本文化人類学会

雑誌

文化人類学 (ISSN:13490648)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.70, no.1, pp.99-113, 2005-06-30

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This paper is an examination of the process through which the mushiyoke rite, performed by the Nenbutsu-ko folk-religious group, has been historically transmitted through changes. In particular, its primary goal is a clarification of historical continuity through transformation, as evidenced in the repeated recuperation of traditional rites in the face of modernity's onslaught, including mercury poisoning (the socalled "Minamata disease"). The field data in this paper come from the village of Sentoji, Yasuda-machi, located in the Kita-Kanbara region of Niigata Prefecture. Drawing on my fieldwork in the village, I will demonstrate the process in which a new jizo carved out of the stone from the shore of Minamata (Kumamoto Pref.) by the patients becomes incorporated into the rite of propitiation conducted by the Nenbutsu-ko religious group. The process demonstrates two points. First, in Sentoji Village, where not only the distinction between the patients and non-patients, but also that between the plaintiffs and non-plaintiffs of the Minamata suit, had separated the population into various groups, the act of constructing the jizo was considered part of the official activities of the village as a whole. Second, the mushijizo, abandoned as a result of the eradication of the Tsutsugamushi disease, has been restored through transformation by the installation of a new jizo from Minamata. The social changes triggered by the modern intervention have been discussed in terms of the "waning [or vanishing] of tradition". The idea that equates the organic whole with the past has been the most dominant mode of discourse in both anthropology and Japanese folklore studies. However, it has proved to be insufficient to understand the local reality in which the people of Sentoji connected their experience of Minamata disease with the traditional mushiyoke rite. In order to emphasize the dynamic aspect of these historical changes, I propose to understand the tradition, borrowing a term from James Clifford, as "authentically remade," which is the concept that highlights the idea of change without letting go of that continuity. The fact that the local people connected the experience of Minamata disease with the traditional rite of mushiyoke is an indication that they have tried to overcome the political division of the village with the help of local tradition-namely, the antagonism produced by the Minamata disease itself. I examine ethnographically how local people have coped with the contradictory nature of modernity: while modernity contributed to the eradication of the Tsutsugamushi disease, it also introduced a new disease-the Minamata disease-to the local community. As discussed above, the transmission of tradition through the dark side of modernity, a seemingly contradictory historical process, has not been explicitly discussed in the previous studies on Minamata disease, which were conducted mostly by sociologists. Its secondary goal is a somewhat theoretical one: namely, the reopening of the field site discursively constructed as "Sentoji, Yasuda-machi," by social-science studies on the Minamata disease, viewing it as an ongoing historical process whose future has yet to be determined.