When did women start keeping their names in marriage?

Question

I'm looking for details about the femenist movement for a paper, particularly when women started to be more vocal about keeping their last name in marriage or hyphenate it. My paper is about the man who want his wife's name, so i'm trying to draw a comparison.. can anyone help?

I'm just basically looking for FACTS please.. like when it became popular in American society?

Answer 1

Women keeping their own names was a radical idea in the mid 1800's. If you are interested in learning some history about an American woman who started the trend of women keeping there names check out this link:
http://womenshistory.about.com/library/weekly/aa062899.htm
In deference to her choice women who wanted to keep their names were called Lucy Stoners.

Personally I've always thought it made more sense keep ones own name no matter what the gender of ones spouse. And it makes much more sense to give children the mother's last name rather than the fathers. Fatherhood can be pretty difficult to determine, motherhood less so.

Among my circle of friends I have know of only one married couple who decided on a shared name that they both chose. Compromise is a good thing!

Answer 2

It's a cultural thing. In Spain and the arabic world the tradition is for a child to take both their mother and father's surname and hyphenate them. Lots of boys are also named after their fathers, but are called their middle names.

It really depends where in the world you're from. I THINK that the jewish tradition is to take the mother's name, though I think that is just for 'jewishness'

Answer 3

It started in about the 1850's, when Lucy Stone refused to take her husband's (Henry Blackwell) name. You can find more on this at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maiden_name.

Answer 4

Royalty has kept the name realitically since
we have recorded history.

Answer 5

...it should only be done for a practical reason, and not "I'm keeping my name, as I'm an empowered individual so nyah nyah, nyah nyah nyah"

Women taking on their husbands name isn't merely some tradition of the patriarchy and oppression of women, it is/was done to carrying on the family line.

One example of a practical reason: there are no male heirs on the said womans side of the family, and there are on the said husbands family, so he takes on her name to preserve her line since his families name is secure.

I am not meaning to be offensive, but keeping your last name just for its own sake is selfish; it's just childish, silly and petty. If one cannot make that step they probably shouldn't be getting married.

Answer 6

alot of women do it for professional/business purposes.