By Christy McConnaughey

The winner of the 10th and final Peter E. Herman Prize for Literary Excellence was J. Herbie DiFonzo, professor of Law.

The Department of Continuing Education said Peter E. Herman endowed the University with funds to conduct a 10- year competition in support of the study of literature. This competition was open to all University faculty, staff and administration. Winners received $500 and were asked to speak about their written work.

DiFonzo lectured on what he refers to as, “Unbundling Marriage” and the legal and cultural changes in family structure.

“Easy marriage and even easier divorce,” DiFonzo said. “Divorce changed as marriage changed.”

DiFonzo said during the 1970s, different husbands fabricated fables in order to divorce their spouse.

Examples DiFonzo used were, “Extreme and Repeated Cruelty” and ‘The Hotel Fable.”

People and the courts took advantage of these fables and used them to get out of their licensed marriages. There was no such thing as mutual consent.

“This fraudulent scenario was broadly acknowledged,” DiFonzo said. “The courts would find the truth harder to believe because there were so many fables.”

The lecture confirmed that marriage is being reshaped now that there is a diverse population. Today, marital status is defined by over 1000 marital laws.

Some people choose to have a relationship without marriage, DiFonzo said. Without a legal license to be married, there can be consequences. DiFonzo argued that because new concepts of marriage such as partnerships are becoming common, there should be responsiveness to the needs of the population.

DiFonzo’s idea is to take different aspects of a couple’s partnership and form them into reasons why they should have the same entitlements as do married couples. Marriage was once defined simply as “one man and one woman united in law for life.” Now, the family formation consists of two parents and children.

Winning the Peter E. Herman prize is not DiFonzo’s only accomplishment. He published broadly on the intersection of family law and juvenile justice. His book, Beneath the Fault Line: The Popular and Legal Culture of Divorce in the Twentieth-Century America, was published by the University Press of Virginia in 1997. He has conducted over 30 jury trials and several dozen appeals.

J. Herbie DiFonzo is this year´s winner of the Peter E. Herman prize for Literary Excellence (Staff Photo)