기획논문 : 노령(老齡)의 민속과 일본사회 제도로서의 "노령"과 개인의 "노령"

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Early ethnological works that discuss the elderly are those of Kunio Yanagita and Shinobu Orikuchi, who sought to understand ancestral spirits and the gods through the elderly. From the 1980s, in accordance with the theory of centrality and peripherality originated by Victor Turner, they point out that the elderly and children have a spiritual and sacred nature because of the peripheral existence they are assigned in society in relation to adults. However, all these perspectives on the elderly draw on images and are not based on data gathered from direct observation of the elderly in real life.Accordingly, the author focused on the miyaza (the ritual organization) system in the handing down of folklore. Many villages in the Kinki region and its neighbors have an established system for elderly men to play certain religious roles after they retire from village management. These roles include lay positions with ceremonial duties to provide service to the ujigami (the shrine of the local tutelary deity). The traditional religious organization of the ujigami shrine in those villages is called the miyaza. Noting that old men form the backbone of the miyaza, the author came to notice the issue of systemic and personal old age. Systemic old age (retirement age and social retirement) and personal (self?aware) old age are two kinds of indicator of aging. Apart from the retirement age system established by the Imperial armed forces in the Meiji period (1868~1912), a traditional village retirement system exists in farming villages in the Kinki and other regions. In this system, the head of the household who reaches the age of 60 is required to release all authority and obligations related to the running of the village to his son and heir, thus ensuring generational change. After relinquishing the authority on practical village affairs, those who retire are expected to play a role in the religious life of the community, such as service work for local Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines. Through this system, their roles change as they grow older, giving them a soft landing into the domain of old age.In the miyaza system, individual experience is particularly significant. Among the interviews the author conducted with the elderly, there were many cases where individual experience such as conquering a serious illness led them to feel true gratitude toward the gods and acquire a new temperament as an elder.In the social environment of systemic old age, it is important to have suitable occasions according to age, such as the nenbutsuko (monthly gathering of devotees of Amitabha) and religious ceremonies at Shinto shrines in traditional Japanese society; retirement age and social retirement systems; and milestone birthday ceremonies such as shoro(40 years old), kanreki(60 years old), kiju(77 years old), and beiju(88 years old). These systems and ceremonies provide people with opportunities to think about their life span and changing roles as they grow older. In the systematization of aging in traditional folklore, one can see how wisdom and ingenuity have provided occasions for each individual to accept their own aging.In our present rapidly aging society, the rarity of old age and the value of a long life are being undermined. On the other hand, rather than entering old age without defenses, there are increasing opportunities to learn about the various forms of old age and to think about how we would like to grow old. Now we are required to choose our own way of living in old age, there is still much we can learn from the wisdom of the tradition of providing occasions to think about aging through contact between men and women of different generations and ages, instead of simply segregating or comforting the elderly.