病人照料与乡村孝道——基于冀南沙村的田野考察

Family Care-Giving and Rural Filial Piety: An Ethnographic Case Study in a North China Village

运用一个北方乡村的田野资料,从慢性病人照料的视角,考察疾病谱的变化对乡村孝道的考验。研究结果表明,老年慢性病人照料不仅影响了成年子女的家庭生活,还带来了家庭关系的变动,并进一步凸显了乡村老人的赡养问题。不过,乡村的养老危机主要不是因为"孝道的衰落"。沙村慢性病人照料的现实表明,尽管面临重重困难,绝大多数子女依然在尽力照料老人;如果过分强调"孝道的衰落",我们就会忽视上述事实,就会忽视农村养老问题的制度根源。

Based on fieldwork data from a North China village, the paper investigates into the ordeal of the changes of disease spectrum on rural filial piety from the perspective of family care-giving for the chronically ill. Results show that taking care of the elderly not only impacts the family life of adult children, but also changes their family relationship, which further highlights the serious problem of supporting the elderly in rural areas. But the primary reason of such crisis is not tb~ decline of filial piety. Fieldwork data shows that most of the a-dult children are trying their best to take care of their parents, although they face a series of difficulties in doing so. If we overemphasize the decline of filial piety, we might neglect both the above-mentioned facts and the institutional roots of the problem of supporting the elderly in rural areas.