# Taking Your Husband's Last Name, or, The Name Game: Paging Married Dopers. **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 7, 2004, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497 "2004-11-07T15:03:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![roger\_thornhill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d9b06d/32.png) [@roger\_thornhill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/roger_thornhill)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 6:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/81 "2004-11-09T06:49:09Z")
Having kicked about universities for much of the last 15 years, it’s interesting to note that while the large majority of western women who marry other westerners don’t take their husband’s name, those who marry “easterners” (Japanese and Chinese mainly) almost invariably do. Usually without hyphenation with their own maiden name. At Lancaster University in England, a renowned leftist hotbed, at least in Linguistics, only one of the married lecturers took her husband’s name, albeit with the title “Dr”. In fact, I only found this out when we were on a departmental retreat in the Lake District and in response to an enquiry about her Slavic background, she took me across the room to introduce me to her husband from Slovakia. ---
**Author:** ![Cazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cazzle/32/75_2.png) [@Cazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cazzle)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/82 "2004-11-09T15:04:55Z")
> [@chatelaine](#): > > This is something I’ve been curious about for a while. If I remember my history correctly, the origins of the female taking the male’s name in marriage has origins in women being considered “property”. Obviously, there are plenty of things with rather unsavory origins that are still worth practicing, but why is this one of them? > > Married Dopers: For the women, did you take your husband’s last name? Why? If you did, did you feel torn about the decision? If you didn’t, did you receive an unusual amount of flak about it? > > Are there any male Dopers who took the last name of their wife? > > Any hyphenated people out there? What made this the best choice? > > Thanks in advance. This topic fascinates me. I took my husband’s name when we got married (for those collecting statistics, I was 25 when we married). Although I liked my maiden name well enough and was fairly attached to it, I wanted to take his name because I’m a bit of a traditionalist. I hate hyphenated names, and would never be comfortable with merging or making up a new name, so it had to be one or the other, and it was also important to him which I respect. I guess we both could have stuck with our original names, but I like sharing a surname and feel that it identifies us to others as a family unit. I like that sometimes people recognise the surname and ask if I know him and I can say “Yes. He’s my husband”. I think it’s convenient that there’s no big discussion or debate to be had if/when we have children - it’s already decided that we’re all taking his name. I guess most of all, as a genealogist I have had many battles in tracing my family tree, and so I like all the official stuff to be as simple, straight forward and predictable as possible, lest some genealogist descendant of mine have reason to curse me the way I’ve cursed some of my dodgy ancestors for their murky paper trails! ---
**Author:** ![mcms\_cricket](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/57b2e6/32.png) [@mcms\_cricket](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mcms_cricket)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/83 "2004-11-09T16:15:45Z")
I had always thought I’d keep my last name, just 'cause it’s mine and I’m the last one in this branch of the family. But when I got engaged I realized that I wanted to take his name too - he was fine with any decision I made, but I liked the traditional quality of taking his name and, as others have mentioned, I thought it was a nice gesture too. But I still didn’t want to give up any of my names (I like my first and middle names), nor did I want to hyphenate. I wrestled with it for a while. In the end, I just added his name to the end. So, my last name is two words with no hyphen - first name middle name mylastname hislastname. Causes no end of confusion in Dr.'s offices, salons, etc., because I never know how I’m entered into the the computers - under mylastname hislastname or under hislastname. And it’s always confusing to have to explain “mylastname hislastame, two words, no hyphen” but I’ve never regretted the decision. It helps that I’m pretty easygoing about what people call me. I don’t get upset if someone calls me “mrs. hislastname” or “firstname hislastname” and I deal with the fact that I will always be explaining it. For some reason, this is what worked for me. ---
**Author:** ![35340](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/3/8baadc/32.png) [@35340](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/35340)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/84 "2004-11-09T16:27:44Z")
I grew up as [mynn] [no middle name] [mylastname]. My name was constantly misspelled as [mynnn] and [mynnzo] and other odd things. My grandmother was famous for always spelling my name with that extra “n”. My last name was always misspelled and pronounced, even though it was ‘ethinc’ and we lived in an ‘ethnic’ town. I don’t look that ethnicity, and often would be asked why I had that last name. My answers ranged from the straightforward “because it is my family’s name” to the snarky “I got it on ebay cheap”. When I married, I was tempted to change my name to [mynn **n**] and then figure out the last name thing, but didn’t. I ended up going [mynn] [no middle name] [mylastname][space][hislastname]. Although my driver’s license says [mynn] [no middle name] [mylastname][hyphen][hislastname] because the drivers license office in this state can’t handle spaces. Though the US government and every credit card company and bank can. One option was to go [mynn] [aquired middle name] [mylastname] [hislastname] because my initials would then spell out his last name … but the only [aquired middle name] I liked was ‘spoken for’ and I couldn’t reuse it within the family political sphere. So now I have two very ethinic names that I spend my entire life spelling and pronouncing for people. "Yes, that’s [mynn] [mylastname][space][hislastname]. The last name is spelled M as in Mary Y as in yellow L as in Larry A as as in apple S as in Sam T as in tuesday N as in Nancy A as in apple …" etc etc etc ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/85 "2004-11-09T17:27:29Z")
> [@CrazyCatLady](#): > > I’m fairly sure she meant when people address stuff to Mrs. Hisfirst Hislast. That bugs a lot of women on both sides of name-change divide, as it sort of implies you have no identity outside of being married. I don’t mind it at all, btw, which shows you can’t generalize (I’m one of the kept-maideners). I amuse my husband to no end when I write on my nametag at his company parties “Dangerosa: Mrs. Brainiac4 Hislastname” I’m actually happier to be referred to as Mrs. Brainiac4 Hislastname or Mrs. Hislastname (both of which I actually am), than Dangerosa Hislastname (which I am not), although even that seldom bunches my panties. ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/86 "2004-11-09T19:13:22Z")
> [@racinchikki](#): > > I’m confused. You took your husband’s last name, but you get mad when people call you by it? :smack: I will not post when I am sleep-deprived… (but then I’d never get to post) It’s Mrs Husband’sfirstname Husband’slastname that I object to. I object so strongly to that convention that I refused to address any of our wedding invitations that way, either. ---
**Author:** ![Unintentionally\_Blank](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unintentionally_blank/32/5418_2.png) [@Unintentionally\_Blank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unintentionally_Blank)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/87 "2004-11-09T19:40:56Z")
Mrs. Blank took my last name and it didn’t seem to bother her. I guess I don’t care what someone picks, thinking that we live in a progressive enough society that ‘an it hurt none, do what ye like’. That said: I’ve found that the women I’ve run into with hypenated names seem to have a large militant-something-to-prove chip on their shoulder. I’m not saying that’s a blanket case 100% occurrence, it’s just the people I’ve have the ‘pleasure’ of dealing with. (Ducks to avoid the volleys of napalm) ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/88 "2004-11-09T19:58:35Z")
Hyphenating wasn’t an option for me. The problem I saw with it was: Suppose I hyphenate my name, and everyone else who gets married does the same. Husband and I get married, and each have two last names, as do our kids. Our kids grow up and get married (for the sake of argument, to someone else with a hyphenated last name), and each have 4 last names. Their kids have 8 last names … and so on and so forth, with the number of names growing by 2^n. If they don’t want this to happen, they have to pick which parent’s name they’ll use. So you avoid choosing which name you want to have, but your kids have to choose between their parents’ names (and thus, between their parents) when they want to get married. ---
**Author:** ![35340](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/3/8baadc/32.png) [@35340](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/35340)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/89 "2004-11-09T20:06:36Z")
not necessarily. Wolfie is [Wolfie] [series of middle names] [hislastname]. ---
**Author:** ![Katriona](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/katriona/32/113_2.png) [@Katriona](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katriona)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/90 "2004-11-09T20:55:32Z")
> [@calm kiwi](#): > > I guess what I am saying is you either have an attachment to a name or you don’t. Change it if it feels right. Don’t if it doesn’t. I wish I’d been that level-headed when we got married. Mr. Kat said he was perfectly fine with me not changing mine if I didn’t want to. Then my mom got a hold of me and convinced me that Mr. K was ‘just being nice,’ and I must be ‘making him feel terrible and unloved’ by not wanting to take his name. I wish I’d trusted that he’d have told me if it was a problem. I loathe being addressed as Mrs., and Mrs. His Name His Name irks the hell out of me, and after 13 years, it seems ridiculous to change it back. ---
**Author:** ![Unintentionally\_Blank](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unintentionally_blank/32/5418_2.png) [@Unintentionally\_Blank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unintentionally_Blank)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/91 "2004-11-09T21:11:22Z")
Loathe? Why? Presumably the Marriage is a happy one, what makes it such a big deal one way or the other? (and I’m not being snide, I’m interested in your viewpoint) ---
**Author:** ![Katriona](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/katriona/32/113_2.png) [@Katriona](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katriona)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/92 "2004-11-09T21:24:11Z")
> [@Unintentionally Blank](#): > > Loathe? > > Why? Presumably the Marriage is a happy one, what makes it such a big deal one way or the other? > > (and I’m not being snide, I’m interested in your viewpoint) I prefer Ms., and it has nothing to do with the state of our marriage. I just prefer Ms. to Mrs. And I don’t appreciate the implication of Mrs. HisFirstName HisLastName that my identity only comes from my relationship to him. ---
**Author:** ![Unintentionally\_Blank](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unintentionally_blank/32/5418_2.png) [@Unintentionally\_Blank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unintentionally_Blank)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/93 "2004-11-09T21:29:03Z")
Yeah, but your identity DOESN’T come with the name on a marriage license. I can’t think of a single time in my whole life where someone said 'She’d have been SUCH a nice person, if she just weren’t Mrs. Some\_Joe’s\_Last\_Name. Perhaps it’s because I’m rotten with names tho. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Katriona](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/katriona/32/113_2.png) [@Katriona](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katriona)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/94 "2004-11-09T21:46:15Z")
> [@Unintentionally Blank](#): > > Yeah, but your identity DOESN’T come with the name on a marriage license. I can’t think of a single time in my whole life where someone said 'She’d have been SUCH a nice person, if she just weren’t Mrs. Some\_Joe’s\_Last\_Name. > > Perhaps it’s because I’m rotten with names tho. :dubious: Sorry if I came across snippy - my inlaws know I prefer Ms., and still send me stuff addressed the way they think it should be (Mrs. His Names), and when they call, they don’t say “Hi, Kat,” they say “Hi Mrs. …” Kind of one of my hot-buttons, so I tend to knee-jerk when someone questions me about it. To me, my name is a large part of my identity, so the notion that I’m only allowed to identify myself with his names is annoying to me. I can’t really explain it any better than that - other people may not care one way or another, but for me, my name is a big part of who I am, so I get annoyed when someone persists in using a name for me that I don’t use myself. ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/95 "2004-11-09T21:48:36Z")
> [@Katriona](#): > > I prefer Ms., and it has nothing to do with the state of our marriage. I just prefer Ms. to Mrs. I use Ms. for everybody, because I have a lousy memory for names and can’t remember who’s Miss and who’s Mrs. I return the favor to others with lousy memories by using Ms. for myself. > [@Katriona](#): > > And I don’t appreciate the implication of Mrs. HisFirstName HisLastName that my identity only comes from my relationship to him. Same here. I do feel that my first name is strongly tied to my identity, in a way that my last name wasn’t before I got married. ---
**Author:** ![Unintentionally\_Blank](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unintentionally_blank/32/5418_2.png) [@Unintentionally\_Blank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unintentionally_Blank)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/96 "2004-11-09T21:56:43Z")
> [@Katriona](#): > > I can’t really explain it any better than that - other people may not care one way or another, but for me, my name is a big part of who I am, so I get annoyed when someone persists in using a name for me that I don’t use myself. A valid point that I hadn’t considered. S’funny, I place a lot of value on names I’ve _created_ for communication with online communities. (And remember getting ticked off when my @attbi.com account was changes to @comcast.net) And that’s just for piddly stuff (not like SSN cards or drivers licenses.) What’s funny/ironic is: I was at the Social Security office getting a duplicate card and overheard a conversation at another window. Apparently, your SSN card is NOT valid ID. This girl wanted to change her last name back on her SSN card and couldn’t do so with just her SSN card and her Driver’s License…IIRC changing it to a new married name was fairly easy. ---
**Author:** ![Katriona](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/katriona/32/113_2.png) [@Katriona](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katriona)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/97 "2004-11-09T22:22:38Z")
> [@Anne Neville](#): > > I use Ms. for everybody, because I have a lousy memory for names and can’t remember who’s Miss and who’s Mrs. I return the favor to others with lousy memories by using Ms. for myself. > > Same here. I do feel that my first name is strongly tied to my identity, in a way that my last name wasn’t before I got married. I just wanted to mention that I love your screen name - I just read Jean Plaidy’s “The Reluctant Queen” about Anne Neville. (I’m a big Richard III conspiracy-theory fan) ---
**Author:** ![davenportavenger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f8ce5/32.png) [@davenportavenger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davenportavenger)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2004, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/98 "2004-11-09T22:36:09Z")
I’m not married, but I don’t think I’d change it if I did get married. My last name is very unusual; it’s the result of an Ellis Island screw-up, so my family is probably the only one in the world with that name, and we’re certainly the only people in America with it. And since I’d like to make a living as a writer, and having a distinctive name can be an asset when it comes to writing (more people will remember you and so forth), I figure I’d be throwing away a good thing if I changed it. Though I do hate the idea of having to go through my whole life spelling out my name, and then having to hear people say “oh, it’s spelled exactly like it sounds!” :smack: I would consider hyphenating it, since I think hyphenated names sound classy, but my name wouldn’t mix well with any other kind of name. ---
**Author:** ![Sleel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/73ab20/32.png) [@Sleel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sleel)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2004, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/99 "2004-11-10T02:07:31Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > There are also a number of places where women have never traditionally changed their names on marriage (Korea certainly, some other SE Asian countries … I think Japan too?) I doubt whether it really meant that women had higher status there though. Maybe other countries, not Japan. When she gets married a woman legally becomes a member of her husband’s family and leaves her own family. The exception is if a Japanese woman marries a foreigner. Then she gains a new entry in the family registry (_koseki_) and becomes the matriarch of that family. Sounds cool until you realize that in effect she’s being told that her husband is nothing, a non-person, because he’s not Japanese; his name is not recorded on the _koseki_. Just recently, about three or four years ago, the laws were changed so that women were allowed to keep their maiden name if they wished, or to keep their husband’s name after a divorce if they had changed it when they married. Before, if they divorced they had to change their names back to their original family name and they had to change to their husband’s family name when they married. [side issue]As of about a month ago, transgender individuals were allowed to change their declared gender. Before that their records would declare them as male even when they had become, for all intents and purposes, female, or vice versa.[/side issue] Interestingly, when I checked my facts by asking around the office this morning, I found out that there is a tradition that provides for the husband to take his wife’s family name. In that case he becomes a part of her family registry and his name is stricken from his family’s _koseki_. This is usually done when there is only a daughter remaining in the lineage and her family doesn’t want their name to die out. It was more common in the past than now, but apparently the custom still exists. Marriage in Japan still seems to be more family/clan centered rather than being more of a private thing between two people like it is in most of the West. ---
**Author:** ![CrazyCatLady](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dfb087/32.png) [@CrazyCatLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CrazyCatLady)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2004, 7:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497/100 "2004-11-10T07:38:11Z")
> [@Unintentionally Blank](#): > > That said: I’ve found that the women I’ve run into with hypenated names seem to have a large militant-something-to-prove chip on their shoulder. It’s odd you should bring that up; I’ve been accused of being angry and aggressive on the subject, although nobody’s actually used the term “chip on my shoulder” or “something to prove.” Not to my face, anyway. In all fairness, I’ve put up with enough passive-aggressive bullshit on the subject that I really don’t have much patience on the subject. I’m so tired of having to remind people, of people expecting me to explain myself and my decision, and so frustrated by having people call me whatever the hell they want to anyway, that I can go from zero to bitch in about 3/4 of a second. Mind you, I don’t care if repairmen and such call me by his last name; they have no way of knowing any different, and they’re strangers who pretty much think of both of us as an account number anyway. But people who actually know me on a personal level? That’s completely different. They know my name, and by god I expect them to use it. I show them enough courtesy and respect to call them by their names; common decency demands they reciprocate. (I have to confess, though, in my heart of hearts I’ve longed for the nerve to say, “Hey, since you don’t have to call me by my name, I’ve decided I don’t have to call you by yours. From here on in, I’m going to call you Fathead Loserpants McDoodoo III.”) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/taking-your-husbands-last-name-or-the-name-game-paging-married-dopers/273497.md?page=6)