Divorce gave us the postmodern family, says sociologist

Irishmen could divorce their wives for bad housekeeping up until the Middle Ages, and women were allowed to divorce their husbands if they gossiped about their marital relations, the Merriman summer school was told yesterday.

In a symposium on Marriage and the Family Challenges for Ireland at the 38th annual summer school in Lisdoonvarna last night, Dr Linda Connolly said: "Marriage is one of the oldest institutions but - contrary to popular belief - so too is divorce of one kind or another."

"In Ireland, despite Christian teaching on the indissolubility of marriage, couples in an unsatisfactory marriage were, until the end of the Middle Ages, legally entitled to divorce by mutual consent," the UCC senior lecturer in sociology said.

"For instance, a woman could divorce her husband for wife beating, sterility, gossiping about their marital relations or failing to maintain her. A husband could divorce his wife for bad housekeeping, persistent illness, barrenness, or if he planned to go away on a pilgrimage or into a monastery. Gradually Christian teaching on marriage spread throughout Europe."

We are now witnessing the postmodern family, she said. "Divorce is considered a symptom of individualisation, where both men and women expect choice, control over their lives and equality."

Earlier at the school, Minister for Justice Michael McDowell said one problem nowadays is the huge emphasis on rights.

"Everybody tries to reduce issues such as whether a road should or should not be built through a particular place to a question of rights. But there are sometimes choices which are not rights-based, that are simply value judgments by society between two different issues.

"I believe in this day and age we have to get away from this notion that the essence of our relationship with each other is a mass of rights - which we all clamour about and scream about at our politicians for - and instead begin for once to talk about the possibility of there being duties," Mr McDowell added.