the name game

With all the weddings I've gone to this summer, I've noticed something interesting. Even the most independent, liberal women I know change their last names when I get married. I know it's a long-standing tradition, but it makes me wonder how often anyone thinks about why women change their names, or if they do so because that's just the way it's done.

I find it interesting, too, that the only women I can think of who have not changed their last names after marriage are members of my family: my sister, my cousin, my aunt. (Am I missing anyone?) If I ever marry, I won't change my name. I've had my name for almost 25 years; having an unusual last name is something of a defining characteristic when you're growing up, and so I have some attachment to it. But beyond that, in recent years I've started considering the patriarchal origins of name-changing, and I'm uncomfortable with following a tradition that has its roots in what was essentially property ownership. The male is the default; children are named with their fathers' names to assert his paternity, and women are renamed with their husbands' names to signify the transfer of property from father to husband.

I know this is not the typical mindset nowadays; most married couples don't believe that one of them owns the other. Most people don't worry about the symbolic implications of name-changing. But I think it's useful to examine where our traditions come from and why we continue to follow them.

When I had James, we gave him Greg's last name because we planned on getting married at some point, and I thought I'd change my name at that point so that we'd all have the same last name as a family. But now that I"ve changed my mind about name-changing, and possibly marriage at all, I regret just a little bit not giving my boys my last name even as a middle name. Greg and I have talked about changing all of our last names to be the same, but my last name is too long for hyphenation, and our last names don't merge well into a new name. Maybe if we ever think of something appropriate for our family, we'll change our names, but until then we're going to live with different last names. This actually has never been an issue -- it's more of a problem for people that we're not married at all -- so it doesn't bother me much to keep it this way, though I do like the idea of identifying our family with a common last name.

But I feel that I'm something of an oddity for thinking so deeply about it. Most women change their names without stressing over it. Has the naming tradition evolved over the years along with the purpose of marriage and the roles of the spouses? Or is our culture holding on to a remnant of a more oppressive time simply because there's been no reason to change? I'm interested to hear others' thoughts on this; particularly if this is something you find worthy of consideration; if you think I'm making too much out of it; if you've had similar thoughts; if you think the typical woman considers this issue. Thoughts?

**Edit: I should clarify (because I wrote this really hastily earlier) that just because I find the origins of the name-changing tradition distasteful doesn't mean that I'm criticizing anyone who does choose to change her name. I realize that many people probably don't find the origins relevant today, and that people have their own reasons for changing their names. I think people should do whatever they want to do -- but I like to ask why we do what we do, as individuals, as human beings, as a society.