The Consequences of Marital Instability

Divorce Rites as a Way of Dealing with a Life Course Transition: The Case of Contemporary Italy

“…Divorce has become more acceptable in Italian public opinion since the early years of the twenty-first century: 71.1% of Italian women and 66.2% of Italian men in 2003 declared to agree with divorce, even in families with children, as the dissolution of an unhappy marital union (Istat 2006). The research highlighted the consequences of divorce, regarding many life domains and leading to a new phase of existence (for a review see Arosio 2009;Todesco 2009).…”

“…At first glance, they appear to be extravagant initiatives or futile attempts to avoid the pain that follows the breakdown of a marriage. In a broader sense, these initiatives may be regarded as tentative steps of an emerging rite of divorce (Arosio 2011), in the absence of established religious or civil rituals. According to Arnold Van Gennep's (1909) three-fold scheme, the preliminary, liminal, and post-liminal phases are supposed to be recognized in the rite of divorce (see also Section 4).…”