His name is my name too?
Nov. 15th, 2009 12:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
serynTwo discussions I've had recently talked about various non-traditional lifestyle choices. One was talking about women taking their new husband's name after marriage. The other is someone who works a weird schedule.
My argument against people not changing their surnames after marriage is that it is difficult for social contacts. It seems to make it unnecessarily cumbersome when holiday cards must be addressed to 6 people instead of "The Family Von Trapp". If you're a family, there needs to be a family name. Friends of my SO's, the woman did change her name for her first marriage, then didn't change it for her second marriage (which is weird, but once your professional name is set...), and she and her new spouse had souvenirs of every marriage... so it was Ms. A, Mr. B, child A, child B, then child A-B and child B-A. Really. Insane. They needed to pick a family name. I sent cards to their sequential dogs.
[Did you ever wonder why the girls on the Brady Show changed their names? Why did Mr. Brady officially adopt them? The previous father died, it wasn't like there was abuse or anything that the children would really want to strip from their identities.]
I've had friends where the husband took the wife's name. I've had friends where they both changed their names.
I've had friends where the woman didn't change her name, but answers to Mrs. [Husband'sName]. I've seen women who didn't change their names and who have professional careers and their husbands get really really angry to be referred to as "Mr. [Wife'sName]". Those men need to think of it like a title: Alfred, Lord Tennyson. They should smile and correct the person politely if needful, but pitching a hissy is inappropriate.
There is absolutely no way to expect anyone to innately guess what people have chosen to do for their family nomenclature. The only guesses people make are based on tradition, so if someone guesses the traditional option, taking offense is wrong.
If you introduce yourself and tell me you just got married, I'm going to call you "Mrs. Lastname" because that is what was the implied request. We have social traditions, being outraged when they are observed is unfair. There are further social conventions for dealing with the nomenclature issue, one might ask the new acquaintance to use one's first name. Or one might specify that despite the marriage, one still prefers "Ms." There is room for cordiality in these adjustments and a polite person studies their forms and practices the specific instances in advance.
That's my position about being asleep during the day. If you do something outside the norm, you cannot expect people to guess the correct behavior.
My argument against people not changing their surnames after marriage is that it is difficult for social contacts. It seems to make it unnecessarily cumbersome when holiday cards must be addressed to 6 people instead of "The Family Von Trapp". If you're a family, there needs to be a family name. Friends of my SO's, the woman did change her name for her first marriage, then didn't change it for her second marriage (which is weird, but once your professional name is set...), and she and her new spouse had souvenirs of every marriage... so it was Ms. A, Mr. B, child A, child B, then child A-B and child B-A. Really. Insane. They needed to pick a family name. I sent cards to their sequential dogs.
[Did you ever wonder why the girls on the Brady Show changed their names? Why did Mr. Brady officially adopt them? The previous father died, it wasn't like there was abuse or anything that the children would really want to strip from their identities.]
I've had friends where the husband took the wife's name. I've had friends where they both changed their names.
I've had friends where the woman didn't change her name, but answers to Mrs. [Husband'sName]. I've seen women who didn't change their names and who have professional careers and their husbands get really really angry to be referred to as "Mr. [Wife'sName]". Those men need to think of it like a title: Alfred, Lord Tennyson. They should smile and correct the person politely if needful, but pitching a hissy is inappropriate.
There is absolutely no way to expect anyone to innately guess what people have chosen to do for their family nomenclature. The only guesses people make are based on tradition, so if someone guesses the traditional option, taking offense is wrong.
If you introduce yourself and tell me you just got married, I'm going to call you "Mrs. Lastname" because that is what was the implied request. We have social traditions, being outraged when they are observed is unfair. There are further social conventions for dealing with the nomenclature issue, one might ask the new acquaintance to use one's first name. Or one might specify that despite the marriage, one still prefers "Ms." There is room for cordiality in these adjustments and a polite person studies their forms and practices the specific instances in advance.
That's my position about being asleep during the day. If you do something outside the norm, you cannot expect people to guess the correct behavior.
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no subject
Date: 2009-11-16 04:39 am (UTC)I don't expect the world in general to "get it" in any specific way as far as not waking me-- but I did think "they're home, I knocked, no one answered" was pretty well key for "they aren't interested in coming to the door."
I'm silly and old-fashioned.
no subject
Date: 2009-11-16 04:57 am (UTC)The topic dovetailed nicely with the discussion about married names... hope you didn't take offense.