I never planned to get married as a kid, and one reason was because I wrongly assumed the woman HAD to change her name. I loved my father and did not want to give up his name ever--I thought it would be a slap in the face to him. But when I got older and learned that I did not have to legally change my name upon marriage, I decided to go ahead and get married. Fortunately, I met and married a man who, although very conservative, did not feel threatened by the name issue. Not only did I keep my last name, but our three children have both our surnames, joined by a hyphen. Our kids have met many other kids their age with hyphenated surnames, including in their classrooms, so it seems normal to them. I would never, ever change my last name. To me, it tells the world I am my father's daughter, and that I am very proud of my ethnic and religious heritage. Also, my father never had any sons to carry on his name, but now he has a grandson who will do it. My stance had absolutely nothing at all to do with feminism...in fact not only am I not a feminist, I am anti-feminist in many ways. You don't have to be a feminist to believe in keeping your last name! Also, as a child I never understood WHY a woman should take her husband's name. What's marriage got to do with it? Does a woman change her favorite flavor of ice cream when she gets married? No? So why her name? A name is such an integral part of who you are...why give it away? It always sounded crazy to me and I was even willing to not ever get married because I once mistakenly thought that a woman had to take the man's name. I had to fight long and hard to keep my name...not with my husband but with many in society who felt they had the "right" to change my name for me (as in documents, mail, etc.) It saddens me to see women today giving up their birth names so easily, when I know what I had to go through in the 1980s to hang onto mine. I am very militant about it because of my experiences. If a salesman calls and asks for "Mrs. His Name", I don't even acknowledge that I am who he means. I simply say, "There is no such person here by that name", and when my mother-in-law was still alive, I'd simply give him her phone number. One amusing side effect of keeping my name is that (because I am more well-known than my husband), people often refer to him as "Mr. (My Last Name)". He thinks its funny and so do I.
Edited 2/4/2006 8:06 am ET by Chana | 
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