ITSUKOKAMOTO

OUR GLOBE IS covered by modem nation-states, which are based on an international system of pure sovereign entities relating to each other legally as equals. It is not unusual to see marriages between different nationalities these days.

Most Japanese will be surprised that kokusai kekkon; literally ‘international marriage’, is an original Japanese concept. But some Japanese think that the term must be a translation from English. But for native English speakers, ‘international marriage’ sounds odd.

Words such as liberty [jiyu;], society [syakai], citizen [shimin] and so on, were translated from English into Japanese in early Meiji period, are indispensable for Japanese people today. Zakkon, which was the word for word translation of the English word, mixed marriage, was one of them. However, Zakkon is no longer used in Japan.

It was at the beginning of twentieth century when the term, kokusai kekkon, became popular. The word can be seen for the first time in a letter dated 2 December in the 44th year of Meiji (1911), which was written by a Japanese man who married an English woman.

This paper will make clear the difference between Zakkon and kokusai kekkon from a sociological point of view and also the significance of kokusai kekkon for Meiji Japan.

ZAKKON (MIXED MARRIAGE) AND KOKUSAI KEKKO

You will find difficulties in translating kokusai kekkon into English or in thinking of the expression for a marriage between two different nationalities. Zakkon or mixed marriage is one of intermarriage. In Western academic journals, the terms of intermarriage are always expressed as an inter-something marriage, such as inter-racial marriage, inter-religious marriage, inter-faith marriage, and inter-cultural marriage, et cetera. Those adjectives in between ‘inter’ and marriage show boundaries, which have been constructed historically in Western society.

An American sociologist, Robert Merton, gave a definition of intermarriage that is ‘marriage of person deriving from those different in-groups and out-groups other than the family that are culturally conceived as relevant to the choice of a spouse.’Merton omitted ‘internationality-marriage’ from intermarriage. Because marriage between persons with grandparents of different nationalities, ‘are socially and culturally in-marriages, not intermarriages’.

A society like the USA, had to establish the nationality of the United States of America, otherwise, people would still remain as English, French, Italian or German.