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Oh, she's the feminist in the family
According to this article in the Chicago Tribune, I am a member of a very small group of women and a group that is getting smaller by the decade. Only 2% of women use only their birth name after marriage.
It's an ok piece, I do like how they point out how hard it has been for women to even have the right to not change their name after marriage:
"Until the 1960s, some states prevented women from voting using their own names. One of them was Alabama. In 1972, a woman named Wendy Forbush tried unsuccessfully to get a driver's license using her birth name. The court ruled that Forbush had to use her husband's name or legally change her name to her birth name. The U.S. Supreme Court ultimately sided with Forbush."
Check out the Lucy Stone League for more info on name changing laws.
Oh, I found the article through the Ms. Magazine blog. You can read the "letters to the editor" that the article inspired here.
Some other points that Ms. brought up were interesting, like how politicians wives are pressured to change their names. I noticed recently how both John Kerry and Howard Dean's wives are now hyphenated, when they were previously listed with no sign of the Kerry or Dean family name. What do expect in politics, I know, but it still gets my feathers ruffled! One commentor made a compelling case that women are taught to be the peacemakers, thus they give in and take the husband's name.
It's an ok piece, I do like how they point out how hard it has been for women to even have the right to not change their name after marriage:
"Until the 1960s, some states prevented women from voting using their own names. One of them was Alabama. In 1972, a woman named Wendy Forbush tried unsuccessfully to get a driver's license using her birth name. The court ruled that Forbush had to use her husband's name or legally change her name to her birth name. The U.S. Supreme Court ultimately sided with Forbush."
Check out the Lucy Stone League for more info on name changing laws.
Oh, I found the article through the Ms. Magazine blog. You can read the "letters to the editor" that the article inspired here.
Some other points that Ms. brought up were interesting, like how politicians wives are pressured to change their names. I noticed recently how both John Kerry and Howard Dean's wives are now hyphenated, when they were previously listed with no sign of the Kerry or Dean family name. What do expect in politics, I know, but it still gets my feathers ruffled! One commentor made a compelling case that women are taught to be the peacemakers, thus they give in and take the husband's name.
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