Back in the medieval ages when a woman was married to a man, they were basically considered property for my understanding and treated like an extension of the man’s person and family. So it was customary for women to take the man’s last name since they were being joined to his family. But now here in the 21st century women are fully independent and last names don’t really seem to mean much of anything. I mean what is Smith or McGregor or any last name really mean anymore? Especially in the digital age, lots of people have digital usernames like SarahSmith1727373. So the last name clearly doesn’t mean much anymore… Which leads me to wonder, why do the majority of women still take the man’s last name? Especially when some of them have a horrible last name? I have seen some butt ass ugly last names recently, like Fink, Weimer, Slotsky/Slotsky, Hiscock (no joke this is a last name), Hardman… And then you hear the woman’s name and it’s like something way more reasonable and less stupid sounding like Kingman, or Harrison, Walls, etc.

  • RBWells@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Well, my last name isn’t my mom’s last name, it’s my dad’s, and her last name was her dad’s, then her husband’s. So why do I care, I don’t get a matrilineal name anyway.

    I hyphenated, because we both had kids when we got married, and it made it easier to deal with the school stuff for my stepkids.

    Otherwise, I really just don’t care because my family name is my dad’s name and it was only my mom’s name because she changed hers to his. Not that I didn’t care about my dad, was closer to him than my mom. I just mean I don’t feel like it means anything.

    ETA: as the OP says, though - I really, truly don’t understand it when a lady has a cool last name and the man an awful one and they still use his. I used to work at a payroll place and saw this happen over and over, someone would be calling up for us to change their last name from, say, Valiant or DeLeon to Assing, or Fuckler or something . Really, why wouldn’t he be the one happy to change in that scenario?

  • litchralee@sh.itjust.works
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    1 month ago

    Pew Research has survey data germane to this question. As it stands, a clear majority (79%) of opposite-sex married women changed their family/last name to their husband’s.

    But for never-married women, only a third (33%) said they would change their name to their spouse’s family name. 24% of never-married women were unsure whether they would or wouldn’t change their name upon marriage.

    From this data, I would conclude that while the trend of taking the husband’s last name is fairly entrenched right now, the public’s attitude are changing and we might expect the popularity of this to diminish over time. The detailed breakdown by demographic shows that the practice was less common (73%) in the 18-49 age group than in the 50+ age group (85%).

    Pew Research name change data

    However, some caveats: the survey questions did not inquire into whether the never-married women intended on ever getting married; it simply asked “if you were to get married…”. So if marriage as a form of cohabitation becomes less popular in the future, then the change-your-family-name trend could be in sharper decline than this data would suggest.

    Alternatively, the data could reflect differences between married and never-married women. Perhaps never-married women – by virtue of not being married yet – answered “would not change name” because they did not yet know what their future spouse’s name is. No option for “it depends on his name” was offered by the survey. Never-married women may also more-strongly consider the paperwork burden – USA specific – for changing one’s name.

    So does this help answer your question? Eh, only somewhat. Younger age and left-leaning seem to be factors, but that’s a far cry from cause-and-effect. Given how gradual the trend is changing, it’s more likely that the practice is mostly cultural. If so, then the answer to “why is cultural practice XYZ a thing?” is always “because it is”.

    • DuckWrangler9000@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 month ago

      Thanks for providing this really detailed and interesting reply. Lots of good insight here. For the ‘Postgraduate degree’ group, I wonder if they’re dramatically higher due to the frustrating problems associated with name changes? Like if you publish an academic paper with your full name, you can’t easily go back and change it, so that may affect it… huh.

      • ChaosCoati@midwest.social
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        1 month ago

        I have friends who published before being married, so now professionally still use their own last name (for continuity) but socially will go by their husband’s last name.

  • Dead_or_Alive@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    A. Many men would not marry a woman who didn’t take their name.

    B. Makes parenting more difficult in social settings by not sharing the last name of your kids. I.E. Picking up your kid at school or making medical decisions about kids and having a different last name as the child forces you to jump through a lot more hoops.

    C. Women tend to grow up knowing they are going to change their last name it’s not even an afterthought. My girlfriend told me her and her friends would often talk about what their name would be if they married a guy they liked.

    D. In some states it is very difficult for a man to change their last name but for women the processes is already in place.

    • Wrrzag@lemmy.ml
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      30 days ago

      Regarding B, the way we do it in the latin world is just by having 2 last names, one per parent. So the child of Jose Perez and Irene Martinez is named Alberto Perez Martinez (the fathers last name is the first by default but you can change order). Its not a problem when picking up children from schools or whatever.

  • Apepollo11@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    I think the only correct answer will be “there are lots of different reasons”.

    My wife took my last name, even though it’s not a good one and I suggested that we pick a new one.

    Here are a couple of her reasons:

    1. She wanted us to have the same surname.

    2. She was very close friends with my cousins growing up, so the name didn’t seem weird to her.

    3. Tradition - she’d always assumed she would change her name to her husband’s name, so that seemed the most normal thing to do.

  • Etterra@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Tradition, mostly. When I discussed this with my fiancee she just wants to - I certainly don’t care. My one cousin went with both hyphenated, in alphabetical order so hers was first.

  • ArtieShaw@fedia.io
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    1 month ago

    I went from a “normal” western last name that was ethnically coded (like McCoy) to another ethnically coded name (like Nguyen, or - um - Fink).

    My options were to keep a common and dull name that I share with people I don’t like, get a new one (that I’d need to spell to every customer service representative ever), hyphenate (HELL NO), or make up something new (which would involve a shitstorm among relatives on both sides.)

    The only real options were A and B. I was undecided until we were leaving the county courthouse after we were married. He asked me “are you going to change your name?” He didn’t care. He thought it was a weird custom and was curious. And I realized - this is an opportunity. It’s a relatively easy and socially acceptable way to shed your old name.

    I took it.

    The new name honestly messes with quite a few people who are meeting me for the first time, and it’s interesting to see how they react. I’ve had people ask straightforward questions (I prefer that - there’s an easy and straightforward answer), get half-way through a straight-up racist comment before they stutter to a stop (helps me get to know them), get all the way through a racist comment (again - helpful to know where you stand), or just not comment at all (just fine by me).

    I’ve found that it’s not the worst way to get a read on someone.

    tldr: part spite, part novelty, part legitimately helpful when your profession means you need to meet strangers and get a quick read on their personality/potential biases/willingness to be straightforward when there’s no reason to be weird about it

  • Surp@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Many people are fine with changing their names and the ones that aren’t won’t do it. There’s your answer. Don’t rag on the people that like changing their name.

  • Araithya@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Can’t speak for all women, but I (and I imagine some others) changed my name because I knew I’d be having kids and didn’t want there to be any confusion. Like, if I’m traveling internationally or if my kid ends up in the hospital, I don’t want one of us having to fish out a birth certificate to prove we’re both the parents. Also I’m of the percent that absolutely hated my long last name so the chance for my name to be shorter and nicer was a no brainer.

      • viking@infosec.pub
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        1 month ago

        In several countries it’s simply not possible, and the family bonds are strong as elsewhere, if not stronger. China for example, family is above everything there, and you can’t change names under any circumstances.

        • Chip_Rat@lemmy.world
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          1 month ago

          That’s something I didn’t know. Do you have time to explain how that works in China? Or if there’s a good video essay on the subject I’d take that.

          • viking@infosec.pub
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            1 month ago

            In China you simply keep your birth name forever, and children always follow the paternal side. That’s why having a male heir is important there, because a woman will only bear offspring for her spouse’s family.

            As to why the family bonds are so strong, it’s part cultural (your elders are always right and must not be criticised, and you must take care of your blood above anything else), part societal - parents work too much (60-100h weekly), so children are generally raised by their grandparents, which strengthens the bond across generations. And because the pension system is totally insufficient, grandparents will at some point typically move in with their kids, so people are used to live in a multi generational household.

            By the way, China is just one example, there are even Western countries where it’s not possible to change the names, such as Luxembourg.

            • Chip_Rat@lemmy.world
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              1 month ago

              Thank you for taking the time. I find it interesting that it is so important in some cultures for the woman to take the husband’s name, and yet in this example there seems to be zero problems with it …

  • Yprum@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    I am originally from Spain but have since moved abroad where partners changing names is common.

    Personally I love the way it is handled in Spain, where you get your family name at birth and won’t be changed by marrying (you could change it but it is not normal to do it when you get married). And the family name is always a combination of both parents. Traditionally it was the first family name from the father and the first from the mother, but nowadays it can be decided which goes first. So officially everyone’s got two family names, one from each parent. Unofficially you can just go as far as you want, so you get your given name, then first family name from one parent, then first from the other, then the second from the first, then the second from the second, etc. So if you track your family tree you can take all family names to make a huge list of them, which is not used for anything but somehow makes you be more attached to all those roots without names being lost.

    Of course that makes it a nightmare when going to other places, everyone thinks your first family name is a middle name and dealing with two family names officially can be a pain. And let’s not go into naming your kids then…

    When I was marrying my wife she asked me how I felt about her changing her name to mine and if I wanted her to do that. She got her father’s name but her mother divorced him later on and changed her name back and my wife’s father was not much part of her life, so she was happy to just change it. I told her that for me that custom is a bit strange and I didn’t need her to do it but would accept it if she wanted to (knowing her background), so whatever she did I wanted it to be her choice, but notice how in Spain people who share family name are siblings, as it is extremely rare for two persons to share both first and second name if not related, so sharing family name with my wife is really odd in a way…

    At the end she changed her name, but because in this country you only have one she only took the first one. While our kids had to take either both of mine or hers (we had our first kid before us marrying and her changing name, so we chose mine), so now we all share the first (and only, in the case of my wife) family name but me and my kids have both my first and second family name (any kids after the first kid must get the same name).

    If that was not complex enough, as I got my kids both nationalities, in Spain the rule is always first of one parent plus first of the other parent, and as the first one was born before us marrying, in Spain he has a different family name than he does where we live.

  • HubertManne@moist.catsweat.com
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    1 month ago

    My wife didn’t and years down the line she says she wish she had. We have to go through more with medical things and such to show we are related and it was like a simple checkbox for her to do it when we got married but to do it now is a major pain in the ass.

  • ZeffSyde@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    I can’t say for sure why. When I got married she just wanted to take one of my names (I have two last names). I’m not famous or anything, so it doesn’t carry any clout. Maybe she wanted a fancy sounding hyphenated name too, because she added one of mine to her current one.

  • Letsdothis@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Especially in the digital age, lots of people have digital usernames like SarahSmith1727373. So the last name clearly doesn’t mean much anymore…

    but you also just used 2 names in your example… others here already said the right stuff, but I reiterate, it’s a lot of symbolism helping create feelings of unity in a family unit, but also there are legal issues/benefits for changing a last name.

  • 2ugly2live@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Makes things easier for both parties when medical issues arise, even more so for parents. And I genuinely believe that a lot of women don’t know it’s an option.

    I actually didn’t change my name when my mom married my dad, so you can really just say “no.” i was in middle school when I decided that, but whenever my dad tried to do anything, he had to jump through hoops. 🤷🏿‍♀️

  • dudenas@slrpnk.net
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    1 month ago

    One other reason I imagine is to establish a single family name, especially with children in mind. I’m not sure it actually works better than a double damily name, but it probably seems so to some.

  • Today@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    My husband and I were not married when our kids were born. I wanted to have the same name as my kids So I gave them my maiden name. I never really liked that name and I wasn’t particularly close to my dad, so when my husband and I got married, we all changed our names to his.

    • WoodScientist@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      I also took my husband’s name when I got married. I personally am not a big fan of hyphenated names. For those that like them, fair enough, but they’re not for me. To me, the problem with hyphenated names is that while they seem a way to avoid the “whose name do we give the kids” problem, they just kick the problem down the road a generation. If you have a hyphenated name, and you marry someone who also has one, are you both going to start using a 4-part surname? How about the generations after that, are they going to use an 8, 16, or 32-part name?

      Of course not. At some point, now or in the future, someone is going to have their surname dropped. It either happens when you get married, or it happens when your children or grandchildren themselves get married and have to decide which names to drop. Rather than putting that burden on your kids or grandkids, I think it’s better to make those hard decisions yourself. Better to just come up with a shared name for both partners and move forward together.