Marriage and changing one's surname.

[Rii]

Unmarried heterosexual male. I'd not want my wife to take my last name as the practice reeks of patriarchy, however if she was insistent I'd likely acquiesce. Similarly I'd have no desire to assume my wife's surname, unless it was really awesome.

 

[Miss Chicken]

For those of you who are married but your spouse has their own name and you have yours. How does it work when you are addressed jointly? Like in my case it's mr and mrs trampledamage - but presumably that's incorrect if you have different surnames.

In Iceland there very few surnames. If Egil Sveinsson married Gudrun Gudmundsdottir they would always be introduced simply as Egil and Gudrun and she would never take her husbands patronymic but would remain Gudrun Gudmundsdottir all of her life. Their son might be Svein Egilson and their daughter might be Eva Egilsdottir, or they might, but far less likely, even use their mother's first name as a matronymic and be Svein Gudrison and Eva Gudridottir.

 

[iguana_tonante]

Some random answers I can give:

I do wonder what happens with a child's surname when neither spouse changes surname. Do the parents just pick one of the surnames? Do the surnames become combined and hyphenated? What if this were to continue over multiple generations? I can imagine someone having a surname like Metzger-Dodsworth-Okragly-Roberts-Krause-Hoffman-Buckley-Dickens.

Around here, usually the children take the surname of the father: they could take the surname of the mother if the parents agree, but I have heard it's a pain in the ass. There is a movement however to make it simpler. Or they can hyphenate it. When continuing over more than one generation, usually they chose one of the surname and lose the other, at choice. Not multiple hyphenations.

I kept my surname when I got married. I have a difficult name to spell & pronounce and his wasn't any better, so I didn't go to the trouble. If I had married a Smith or Jones, my last name would have been changed in a heartbeat.

Then if your name is so cumbersome, may I ask you why you just did not change it by your own? Why wait to marry in a "good" surname? Just curious...

For those of you who are married but your spouse has their own name and you have yours. How does it work when you are addressed jointly? Like in my case it's mr and mrs trampledamage - but presumably that's incorrect if you have different surnames.

When my parents receive jointly addressed mail, it's to "Mr. Smith and Ms. Brown". Simple as that. There is no "Mrs. Smith" (if you really want, my mother could be "Mrs. Brown in Smith", but it's very unusual).

 

[Bears Discover Fire]

I'll never change my surname. It's too integral to my identity and I don't want to feel 'owned' by my hypothetical husband's family. The religion I was raised in insisted that women be second class citizens in a marriage arrangement and taking the husband's surname was the first step; for that reason alone I have some rather strong feelings against changing my name.

Patriarchy is not acceptable, even in the supposedly innocuous holdover tradition of taking the husband's surname.

I would consider a hypenation for the family unit, if it had a nice ring to it.

 

[Aurian]

I would not mind changing my name.

 

[Sky]

I'm a married woman and I changed my name. My old name was one of the most common surnames in my country. My new one is kind of rare and much prettier. (If my spouse had been my country's equivalent of Mr. Smith or Jones, I would not have changed my name.)

 

[JuanBolio]

Unmarried man, and it doesn't matter to me.

 

[Gertch]

Your poll has a lot of happy people but it's missing a happy man married to a happy woman who took my name for some reason. That's what I would have picked. Of course I wouldn't have married someone that wouldn't take my name. Not as much because of that as it's a signal they put the family second.

Taking a husband's last name helps define the family. It helps define the children and gives everyone a sense of belonging. Anti-family groups have really done society harm with their crap.

 

[JuanBolio]

Your poll has a lot of happy people but it's missing a happy man married to a happy woman who took my name for some reason. That's what I would have picked. Of course I wouldn't have married someone that wouldn't take my name. Not as much because of that as it's a signal they put the family second.

Taking a husband's last name helps define the family. It helps define the children and gives everyone a sense of belonging. Anti-family groups have really done society harm with their crap.

Would it be the same for you if the husband took the wife's last name?

 

[Gertch]

If that's what the tradition was, sure.

 

[JuanBolio]

If that's what the tradition was, sure.

So you just go entirely by tradition, then?

 

[Miss Chicken]

When my marriage broke up I reverted back to my maiden name and changed my children's name to that as well. You should have seen the flak I got for some people saying I had no right to change their names away from their father's name.

Their father never visited them, never paid child support, obviously didn't care a shit about them, so why in the fuck should they have kept his name?

Why did so many people many people think it was better that they keep the name of their deadbeat father? Because they considered an stupid outdated tradition to be important.

 

[Daneel]

Your poll has a lot of happy people but it's missing a happy man married to a happy woman who took my name for some reason. That's what I would have picked. Of course I wouldn't have married someone that wouldn't take my name. Not as much because of that as it's a signal they put the family second.

Taking a husband's last name helps define the family. It helps define the children and gives everyone a sense of belonging. Anti-family groups have really done society harm with their crap.

Well, the concepts of marriage and the family are not as limited and simple as they used to be, it's true... but I personally like it that way. And I fail to see how something as innocuous as not taking the name of your spouse constitutes being labelled "anti-family".

As for my poll missing "a happy man married to a happy woman who took my name for some reason", well, did you miss option 1? I don't see why that wouldn't fit for you.

 

[JuanBolio]

Taking a husband's last name helps define the family. It helps define the children and gives everyone a sense of belonging.

The children belong as much to the mother as the father.

Anti-family groups have really done society harm with their crap.

Really? What have they done that has harmed society? Moreover, what constitutes an anti-family group?

 

[Miss Chicken]

The children belong as much to the mother as the father.

Or in my case my children belonged more to me than to their father or their father's family.

Of my ex-husband's family only one of his uncle (and that uncle's wife) made an effort to still be in my children's lives. They started to introduce me as their niece and I do consider them my uncle and aunt. This is my ex-husband's maternal uncle so he had a different surname than my ex-husband.

 

[JuanBolio]

The children belong as much to the mother as the father.

Or in my case my children belonged more to me than to their father or their father's family.

Of my ex-husband's family only one of his uncle (and that uncle's wife) made an effort to still be in my children's lives. They started to introduce me as their niece and I do consider them my uncle and aunt. This is my ex-husband's maternal uncle so he had a different surname than my ex-husband.

Indeed so, Miss Kitty, indeed so.

 

[Caretaker]

I'm unmarried heterosexual male, and I have a long Polish last name. Whoever my future spouse is, I hardly expect her to take my last name (that, and my mom didn't take my dad's last name when they married, so I grew up thinking that was the norm).

 

[TheLonelySquire]

As a traditionalist I would expect my wife to take my name. And she has.

 

[TheLonelySquire]

I'm not married, but if I ever am, I would leave it up to my wife what to do about her last name.

I don't know if I could take hers, though. I'd have to talk to my dad first.

Yeah, I know, I'm an adult and I can make my own choices, but my dad gave me everything - including my name - and if I ever changed it, I'd want to clear it with him first. I owe him that much, at least.

That's just all kinds of sad. You're a grown adult, make your own damned mind up when it comes to your life. Your parents don't have control over you for your entire life.

Without our parents we wouldn't be here. We do indeed owe them on many levels.

 

[Gertch]

As for my poll missing "a happy man married to a happy woman who took my name for some reason", well, did you miss option 1? I don't see why that wouldn't fit for you.

Yeah it fits but there are options for happy men and happy men, happy women and happy women. Why can there be one for happy men and happy women?

Taking a husband's last name helps define the family. It helps define the children and gives everyone a sense of belonging.

The children belong as much to the mother as the father.

I never said otherwise.

Anti-family groups have really done society harm with their crap.

Really? What have they done that has harmed society? Moreover, what constitutes an anti-family group?

Way to much to get into here and probably much too controversial for the kinder more masturbating Misc. But pose that in TNZ if you wish.