Individualization in the Domain of the Burial, Grave and Funeral Rites: The Dissolution of the Modern Japanese Family Form

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  • MORI Kenji
    Department of Literature Cross-cultural Studies, Ibaraki Christian University

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  • 葬送の個人化のゆくえ
  • ソウソウ ノ コジンカ ノ ユクエ ニホンガタ カゾク ノ カイタイ ト ソウソウ
  • —日本型家族の解体と葬送—

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A significant paradigm change has taken place in the domain of burial, grave, and funeral rites in Japan. The modern Japanese family has continued the tradition of ancestor worship, and civil law of Japan has accepted it, but it has become difficult to find a “religious service successor” (atotsugi) in a family as birthrates declined at the end of the 20th century and the form of the modern Japanese family following traditional practices began to dissolve. People came to have fewer connections with their local area and with family and relatives, and hoped to be able to decide on the method of burial and funeral services by self-will (self-determination) in a society where everything was available for exchange as a product in the marketplace. I called this social phenomenon “individualization in the funeral and burial domain.” <br>Funeral services came to be conducted only by families, and the death was not conveyed to society. Jumokusou (planting a tree in substitution for a gravestone) and the scattering of ashes became widespread as graves became unavailable for succession. On the other hand, the number of people unable to hold a funeral service increased among the poor and needy. This difference became marked in the domain of burial, grave, and funeral rites under the development of neo-liberalism.

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