雖然浪漫的情感在聯姻社會，似乎該有其位置，但目前人類學硏究對於聯姻 與個人的情感、情緒之間，所可能蘊含的豐富與複雜，還是缺乏足夠的理解（De Munck 1996)。在以嚴謹的村寨內婚爲優勢的聯姻邏輯與實際裡，個人的情感如 何從中尋找出路？本文就傳統以來相對普遍的貴州苗人私奔婚，說明聯姻的理想、 結構與個人情感的內容，以及情感與婚姻的關係，可以經由民族誌的描述與討論， 獲得進一步的理解。當代貴州東部高地苗人的私奔婚在婚姻結構上，雖未符合村 寨內婚的優勢，但多半並沒有違背交表聯姻的理想。然而每當私奔婚發生，女家 在情緒上總交雜著因違背村寨內結群理想，或禁婚與不倫，而產生的傷心，甚至 是憤怒的情緒。苗人的私奔婚展現情感及文化上的「個人性」，以及個人情感、集 體情緒與聯姻結構之間，不必然一對一的曖昧。經由對當代苗人村寨所發生的私 奔婚個案的描述與分析，本文指出，在以聯姻爲理想及實際的社會裡，個人」與 「集體」之間的拉扯，相當關鍵地，可能透過情感與結構間的對話來展開。換言之， 在一個以交表聯姻爲理想及實際的社會，選擇私奔婚的新娘，是在私奔婚所引發 的不確定及特定的曖昧，以及交表聯姻所展現的確定與整體的曖昧之間，做了權 衡。私奔婚展現了高地苗人在婚姻與情感之間的複雜，應是一個値得做爲人類學 思考聯姻結構與情感之關連的例子。

Though De Munck (1996) argues that “love” may have a place in arranged marriages, the richness and complexity of sentiment in prescriptive marriage has long frustrated anthropological understanding. Is there a place for romantic sentiment or personal emotion in a restricted marriage system? This paper aims to understand the intersection of prescriptive marriage and individual sentiment through an ethnography of Miao elopement in eastern Guizhou. Today, much like before 1949，marriages occur after a brief courtship; they may or may not involve romantic love and divide more-or-less evenly between public marriages and elopements. Public marriages revolve around, and must come to terms with, the positive rule of prescriptive crosscousin marriage within village endogamy. Elopements violate village endogamy, are finalized when the bride crosses the doorsill with her groom in the middle of the night, and occur without her family’s prior consent or knowledge. This essay considers elopement from the perspective of a bride’s weighing the uncertainties and special ambivalence of an alternative cognatic marriage against the certainties and general ambivalence of a restricted marriage. Moreover, elopements make intelligible Miao ambivalence about the collective marital ideal and individuality.