What's in a Name?

A mini-rant in the Daily Iowan against the practice of changing your name upon marriage. She's "horrified" women would even consider such a thing. She likens it to the pre-Civil War era custom of forcing slaves to adopt their master's names.



I agree that imposing a name change requirement on a woman or a man upon marriage would be a forced depersonalization at a very basic level. Women, and men, should think long and hard about what they want for a marital name . . . and most do.



It's a deeply personal choice.



Get that? Choice.



Some agree with the author - your name is your name, period. You should be proud of it. To consider changing it means you've been brainwashed by the white, patriarchal society in which we were all raised. Others feel that taking the same name as their partner, whatever that name will be, is a symbolic act of starting a new, cohesive family unit. Others just want what sounds best, to heck with history. Couples combine, hypenate, or simply choose a name. And it's not always the man's. (She snipes at the number of couples with only one marital name, but how does she know it's his? Did she ask? I know she's playing the percentages, but still.)



I don't know whether it occurs to the author that the act of changing one's name - or not changing it - is a matter of personal choice. To presume that I, or any reader of a college newspaper, is so uneducated as to not take into account the potential symbolism behind my choice of a name is insulting. To force her cultural values into my personal choice is wrong.



One caveat: I was always annoyed when people would address correspondence to me as "Mrs. (His first name) (His last name)." Taking on a familial last name is one thing, but why would anyone presume I'd taken his first name? I know it's the old traditional sense of addressing an envelope, and I don't have a problem with anyone else choosing to use this for themselves. But if you're going to the trouble of handwritten corresponence in these electronic times, don't you think you should take the care to address the envelope in the manner to which the recepient would like to be referred?