Abstract
The village of Shirakawa, located in a mountainous region in Hida area, was designated by the UNESCO World Heritage Foundation as the Historic Villages of Shirakawa and Gokayama in 1995. Today, this village is famous for its gassho-style thatched houses, and is widely recognized as a region preserving the traditional Japanese landscape. This paper analyzes how Shirakawa village achieved such recognition and examines how the image of the mountain village has changed in modern Japan. During the Meiji era, Shirakawa village viewed as an uncivilized “other world” populated by the illiterate; in particular, its extended family system was thought to be a barbaric custom. In that extended family system, none except the patriarch was allowed to marry. Some newspaper articles reported that this led to immorality. This image began to erode in the late Taisho era. In the beginning of the Showa era, the traditional customs of Shirakawa, for example, the family system, folk songs, and thatched houses with a steeply pitched roofs attracted a great deal of public attention as a cultural heritage. Factors in the changing image of this village are examined from the following two viewpoints. The first factor was the change in industries, traffic, and customs in Shirakawa. Until the latter half of the Meiji era, the main occupations of village people were agriculture and sericulture. In the Taisho era, a power plant and a forestry company newly relocated to the area, and shops, inns, and restaurants opened for business. Additionally, roads from the town of Takayama to Shirakawa were constructed in the 1930s, and therefore it became possible for visitors to travel easily to the village using this modern public transport. The second factor was a blossoming of intellectual activity in Hida area. During the prewar Showa era, folklorists and travel agents in Takayama and Gero actively advertised this area. Shirakawa was presented as a historical village with beautiful scenery and traditional customs. In Takayama, Ema Nakashi and his wife Mieko established the Hida Archaeology and Folklore Society and researched Shirakawa folkways. As a result, Shirakawa became well known among ethnographers those interested in local studies as a rare region where traditional customs were preserved. Numerous researchers, students, and journalists often visited this village under the guidance of the Emas to observe the family system, history, farmhouses, and scenery, and were aware that the traditional culture remained intact. Some intellectuals in Hida area had recognized the cultural value of gassho-style thatched dwellings before Bruno Taut introduced them internationally.
