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Tuesday, May 17, 2005
Women and last names
Volokh asks why professional women who consider themselves feminists nevertheless frequently choose to change their last names upon getting married.
But he only wants responses from women.
Here at prawfsblawg, we are happy to provide an opportunity for everyone to weigh in.
UPDATE FROM ETHAN: Dissemination.org had a long dispute about a similar issue here, when France abandoned its age-old practice of requring children to take their father's name. It also covered whether married people should have separate accounts here. My position, in case it isn't obvious: women who take their husband's last names are doing women as a class a tremendous disservice. I suspect AmosAnon1 disagrees under his assumption that all choices are liberating and should be affirmed.
Posted by Hillel Levin on May 17, 2005 at 11:09 AM in Culture | Permalink
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» taking his name from divine angst
Eugene Volokh asks women who did so why they changed their names when they got married. Unfortunately, comments still aren't open on his post, so I'll answer here. (More discussion can be found at Prawfsblawg.) I changed my name when... [Read More]
Tracked on May 17, 2005 2:49:46 PM
» taking his name from divine angst
Eugene Volokh asks women who did so why they changed their names when they got married. Unfortunately, comments still aren't open on his post, so I'll answer here. (More discussion can be found at Prawfsblawg.) I changed my name when... [Read More]
Tracked on May 17, 2005 4:00:36 PM
» taking his name from divine angst
Eugene Volokh asks women who did so why they changed their names when they got married. Unfortunately, comments still aren't open on his post, so I'll answer here. (More discussion can be found at Prawfsblawg.) I changed my name when... [Read More]
Tracked on May 17, 2005 6:04:25 PM
Comments
You suspect wrong. I'm all in favor of women keeping their last names. But, unlike you, I'm not paleolithic enough to believe that a man should force his wife to do so against her will. ;-)
Keeping last names is important insofar as one's name for 18, 25, or 50 years prior to marriage is part of a woman's identity; and also insofar as it sends an important social message about the nature of the marriage relationship and the rejection of traditional gender roles.
My tolerance of a woman's choice to change her last name is just that: tolerance.
Here's why it differs from the case of staying home with children: I think that a parent choosing to stay home with children can be a very constructive and valuable choice on the personal, familial, and social levels. Therefore, what I'd like to see is more men making that choice; without demanding that women STOP making that choice.
By contrast, I see no great independent value of anyone, male or female, changing his/her last name upon marriage. So while I will tolerate the decision, I hardly think it is "a liberating choice that should be affirmed."
Posted by: amosanon1 | May 17, 2005 11:53:17 AM
Well, I don't believe in domestic violence over the issue. But I'm glad I had you pegged wrong.
Posted by: Ethan Leib | May 17, 2005 11:58:52 AM
More interesting than the name a married woman carries, I think, is the psychology behind ardent, and vocal, feminist men. I've always suspected men on both ends of this spectrum -- the ostentatious male chauvanists on the one hand, and the ostentatious male feminists on the other. What is it that makes a man adopt these positions? Who are they addressing, as the vast majority of us listen in bored silence? I've always thought they are in fact talking past us, to their mothers, with that "look-at-me-please-look-at-me" desperation in their faces.
Posted by: Harold Mienkewicz | May 17, 2005 1:31:48 PM
What about the children? I never even considered taking my husband's name, let alone changing my name. The hard part for us was deciding about the children's last names. We finally agreed on a hyphenated Amir-Lobel for the our girls, his name coming first because of phonetics. But my feminist jurisprudence law professor insisted on only giving her name to her children, and her husband agreed as a corrective justice measure...
Posted by: Orly Lobel | May 17, 2005 2:25:59 PM
We gave our dog a hyphenated name, Zeke Leib-Schonfeld. But we're planning on just going with whatever sounds best. If a boy, we like Gus as a first name. Gus goes better with Leib. If a girl, we like Yoshimi Rimona. That sounds better with Schonfeld. So we'll have some of each, I suppose. Check out the string on Dissemination, which is pretty interesting, I think.
Posted by: Ethan Leib | May 17, 2005 3:16:22 PM
I changed my last name when I married... mainly because I liked my husband's last name better from an aesthetic perspective. Of course, if his last name had been "fukhead" or something I would have felt differently.
My "maiden" name was my father's. Why does feminism require loyalty to one's father's father's father's father's name? And who really cares anyway?
Posted by: toodle | May 17, 2005 3:33:32 PM
I kept my name because, well, it's my name and I consider it part of my identity, my connection to my family. Unlike the mates of many of the commenters on the VC, my husband was not offended or hurt or insistent that I take his name; in fact, he was the one to initially raise the issue by saying, "I can't imagine changing my last name after using it for 30 years, so I don't expect you too, either." I think that captures the point: women who grow up with a traditional romantic vision of what life is "supposed" to be like--even if they are "feminists" (whatever that means)--have it in their heads all along that they will one day change their names, so it is not difficult to surrender it when the time comes.
I really didn't have that vision (or the one where on my wedding day, I would be the Queen and all had to bow before me in my big white dress), and when the time came for me, my now-husband and I both understood how important it was for me to keep my name.
Posted by: dgm | May 18, 2005 8:47:19 AM
Apropos of what toodle said, I just had an interesting discussion with a Japanese friend of mine last night. He changed his name to his mother's last name, not out of any feminist impulse, but because his paternal grandparents had other sons besides his father, whereas his maternal grandparents had no sons. So he took his mother's last name to perpetuate his maternal grandfather's patriarchal line.
Now, he's getting marrried, and it looks like he's going to have to change his name again, because his brother also took his mother's last name, leaving a male scion for his maternal grandfather, whereas his future father-in-law has only daughters!
He claims that this is the common practice in Japan: men and their children take the wives' name when there are other male children on the father's side but not the mother's.
Posted by: AF | May 18, 2005 10:14:45 AM
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