What's In a Name?

Right now I am no where near getting married, but I decided a long time ago (before I defined myself as a feminist) that I was not going to change my name if/when I get married.

My mom kept her name, which I remember causing a lot of confusion among my friends growing up. It seemed so normal to me because that's what I grew up with. But I would always feel a little upset when my friends called my mom Mrs. Sundstrom instead of by her own name, not that they knew any better at first. When I was very young, I didn't understand why my friends just assumed that my mom shared my dad and I's last name. As I aged, I came to understand that it was societal convention that the woman has the same last name as her husband.

Going into late elementary school and on, I would sometimes get asked if my parents were divorced when my friends found out that my parents had different last names. Because in my conservative community (and in the rest of society), the only way that a woman can have her maiden name is if she is divorced from her husband.

Certainly my mom had some influence on my decision to not change my name, but once I started learning more about feminism, I was finally able to express some of my real motivations behind this decision. I do not want to change myself when I get married. My name is part of who I am. And part of who I am is also an independent woman and I feel that as an independent woman, I should not have to change my name to enter into a partnership with a man.

Via a tweet from Ashely at Small Strokes, I learned of an article at The Globe and Mail entitled, "I took my wife's last name." The author goes through his decision to take his wife's name upon marriage and the struggles that he faced, both within himself and from friends and family.

In discussing why he chose to change his name, he says...

I did it because I love Mona - because I wanted her to know that I didn't expect her to become anyone other than herself. It mattered to me that we shared a name, so I reasoned I should be the one to offer mine up.

I think that this reason says a lot about what kind of person this man is and about how much he respects his wife and her values. He starts the article by saying that the decision was completely his, that his wife didn't even ask him to do it.

In today's society, I feel like a woman's decision to keep her name is not as uncommon as it was even when my parents married about 27 years ago. Some people still hold the expectation that the woman will change her name, but it is certainly more socially acceptable to keep your name. But even when it is not uncommon for a woman to keep her name, it is almost completely unheard of for a man to take his wife's name. Why?

I think that some women don't want to change their name because it would show a kind of dependency on a man. So if a man changes his name, is there an assumption that he is dependent on a woman? And why would that be so wrong? In any relationship there is a certain amount of emotional (and other kinds) dependency on the other person. But men would never admit that by taking his wife's name.

Every woman has the right to keep her name and every man has the right to change his name. And just because I have decided to keep my name doesn't mean that a woman who decides to take her husband's name is wrong or anti-feminist.