Question in title.
I realize there may not have been enough ssms yet for there to be a general practice of anything, and I also realize that in lots of straight marriages nowadays nobody takes anybody’s name either.
I don’t think there’s a common practice yet. From people I know, most keep their own names, and certainly here in the UK where we have Civil Partnerships (all but marriage, without the ‘m’ tag), you’d need to go through a legal process to change it (not complex, but another step), whereas it’s not required for straight traditional marriages.
In Ontario, two spouses can legally take any combination of their former family names that they wish: both take Spouse A’s name, both take Spouse B’s, or both take a hyphenated combination in either order, or neither change their name. This was true even before same-sex marriage was legalised.
It ends up being according to the preferences of those getting married.
There’s no bar in UK law to changing one’s name. Anyone over the age of 16 is free to call themselves what they choose. Of course, government departments require evidence of identity for passports, etc. That’s where deed polls come in, but they’re for documentation purposes, not a legal requirement.
My SO is rather attached to his last name, so isn’t interested in taking mine or hyphenating. I would consider taking his but it really isn’t that important to us. Many other couples I know also keep their own last name.
I hate to be a jerk about this but if you still have to go through the regular legal steps then it’s not all but marriage without the “m” tag.
It’s the same way in the United States, the problem is getting anyone to accept this.
In the US you can call yourself anything as long as it’s not for illegal or fraudulent purposes. But you also can’t just walk into the social security office or driver’s license place and say “Change Mr John Smith, to Mr John Doe.”
They won’t do it, so while you legally can do that, in effect you need the proper legal channels to make the change a reality
In Hawaii, a resultant married couple can call themselves anything they want, limited to their middle and last names, within the marriage statute. The can kept their own respective names or adopt some kind of hybrid name or even swap names, or go as far as to create a whole new name for each.
John Smith + Tom Jones =
John Smith & Tom Jones :o
John Smith-Jones & Tom Jones-Smith 
John Jones & Tom Smith 
John Harry Brown & Tom Harry Brown :eek:
They just gotta file with the Bureau of Vital Statistics. It’s a shortcut past the name change statute.
I think it’s implicit in the OP that all these options are available. The question is whether any of the options are more popular than the others.
Your point isn’t clear.
Yes, but try persuading people of that and see how far you get. People are convinced that without the deed poll certificate, you’re not officially who you say you are. This post which I made only two days ago, addresses this very point.
Most that I’ve known just continue to be Tom (or Mary) Smith and John (or Susan) Garcia- no change on either side. I think etiquette as far as wedding announcements is to refer to the participants in alphabetical order (the Garcia-Smith or Brown-Garcia wedding) if you refer to it as all. I’ve known two gay couples who adopted children who, since this is AL where gay couples cannot adopt- were legally adopted by only one partner, but they took the other partner’s surname as part of their legal name (Baby Garcia Smith [not hyphenated as Garcia is actually a middle name]).
Googling, it seems the number of women who now keep their surnames upon marriage is between 10-15%, incidentally.
I changed mine to my partner/husband’s name when we got married in Ontario, and got my Canadian passport issued in my new name… And being a dual citizen, I was just about to change my name on my U.S. passport…
I then found out that because of the Defense of Marriage Act, I can’t change my name with Social Security or on my U.S. passport… So, I ended up changing it back in Ontario too… and have a Canadian passport good for 10 more years in a different name…
I’m glad that straight marriages are now protected. :rolleyes:
Well if we’re going to get pedantic, currently a man doesn’t have automatic rights to change his name to his wife’s upon marriage, without an additional legal step. Does this make it a marriage for the woman but not for the man?
Not to mention that in many jurisdictions, the newlywed wife must also apply for a formal name change if she wants to take her husband name.
Just like other legal issues, it’s not possible to make general assertions about what the rules are about changing one’s name. These statements may be the case for these posters’ jurisdictions, but other jurisdictions may have other rules.
For example, in Saskatchewan, the husband does have the same right to change his name on marriage, and there is no need for a formal application, as set out by this Saskatchewan government website: