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Women and Marriage
serious crayons:
Mel! How great to see you! :D
The name thing does get exhausting. If you want to be free of patriarchal influence, you have to color way outside the lines. I know a woman who tried to get around it by adopting both her parents' last names as her name, connected by a backslash, not a hyphen. As in, Jane Smith/Doe. But of course, whichever was her mother's name presumably would still have the taint of patriarchy.
The only way out is to go the Malcolm X route, I guess. The problem there is that the X has a tone of antagonism and rejection, understandably of course. And most women who are concerned about their last name don't want to out and out reject their fathers and husbands. They just want to assert their own identities.
opinionista:
--- Quote from: serious crayons on December 10, 2008, 06:40:24 pm ---Thanks for the info, Leslie! And good choice on your daughter's middle name. ;)
I had a friend with no middle name, and she was constantly referred to as "none." As in, Jane None Smith.
--- End quote ---
In my family us girls don't have a middle name. Only my brother does and he doesn't like it and always goes by his first name. He doesn't even add the initial. Very few people know he actually has a middle name. So it turned out to be pointless for my parents to give him one.
delalluvia:
--- Quote from: serious crayons on December 11, 2008, 01:42:55 am ---
The name thing does get exhausting. If you want to be free of patriarchal influence, you have to color way outside the lines. I know a woman who tried to get around it by adopting both her parents' last names as her name, connected by a backslash, not a hyphen. As in, Jane Smith/Doe. But of course, whichever was her mother's name presumably would still have the taint of patriarchy.
The only way out is to go the Malcolm X route, I guess. The problem there is that the X has a tone of antagonism and rejection, understandably of course. And most women who are concerned about their last name don't want to out and out reject their fathers and husbands. They just want to assert their own identities.
--- End quote ---
Naw, I never get tired of being a feminist. How could I? That's who I am.
What's sad is it's so ingrained in many cultures for the women to suborn their identities to their husbands that some of their menfolk don't consider it that. Instead they consider it a sign of "joining" or being "one" and are hurt if their wives won't do it.
But on the other hand, some of the men certainly don't consider it a sign of "joining" or being "one" if asked to give up their names. They consider it for exactly what it is - a submissive act - and they don't like it.
And some actually get angry and/or what's worse, think it's a joke if it's even suggested that they do what they fully expect their wives to do.
One woman had the best response when asked why she didn't take her husband's name.
"Because he won't take mine."
Front-Ranger:
I adopted my mother's middle name as my name (it's also my middle name). I like middle names. I think of them as an opportunity to express your hidden but true self, to pay your respects to ancestors, and to carry on matrilineal traditions. My daughter's middle name is Giuliana. It's Italian for gardener. And sure enuff, she is a gardener. These women in Italy knew about herbs and natural healing plants and cultivated plants as food and medicine.
serious crayons:
--- Quote from: delalluvia on December 11, 2008, 12:47:39 pm ---Naw, I never get tired of being a feminist. How could I? That's who I am.
--- End quote ---
Oh Del, I certainly wasn't suggesting that.
I was simply saying ... well, just what I said. If you want your name to be completely free of the taint of patriarchy, you pretty much have to start from scratch and make something up. Or maybe go Cher's route. ;D
If marriage is about equals forming a joint partnership, then both spouses hyphenating both their names is most appropriate. For example, the (male) minister who performed my mother's funeral has a hyphenated name for that reason. But outside of Unitarian pastors (and other especially feminist/progressive male groups), there aren't that many men who want to do that.
So, failing that, women can just keep their own names. Which is easier anyway, especially if they have a professional identity associated with their name. I wouldn't have wanted to change my name, not even to a hyphenated one, and frankly not even if my husband had done the same.
When I hear of a woman with a hyphenated name, and her husband DOESN'T have one, it strikes me as pretty much the same as changing her name altogether -- a unilateral concession.
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