Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site ubc-cs.UUCP
Path: utzoo!utcsri!ubc-vision!ubc-cs!andrews
From: andrews@ubc-cs.UUCP (Jamie Andrews)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Re: Names, Marriage, and Offspring
Message-ID: <3@ubc-cs.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 16-Sep-85 13:54:08 EDT
Article-I.D.: ubc-cs.3
Posted: Mon Sep 16 13:54:08 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 16-Sep-85 19:42:21 EDT
References: <310@decwrl.UUCP>
Reply-To: andrews@ubc-cs.UUCP (Jamie Andrews)
Organization: UBC Department of Computer Science, Vancouver, B.C., Canada
Lines: 25
Summary: 

In article <310@decwrl.UUCP> dyer@tau.DEC writes:
>Hyphenization  I see two main problems with hyphenization.  The first is that
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~  the number of names hyphenated increases exponentially with each
>generation.  Two people with hyphenated last names could, if all marry hyphen-
>ated people and hyphenate *their* names, have grandchildren with sixteen names
>hyphenated together.  The other problem is deciding whose name comes first in
>the new hyphenated name.  To base it on sex would, of course, be sexist.

     This is a great article, and I especially like the "family name" scheme
too.  However, I have a suggestion referring to the "hyphenization" scheme:
when Ms. A-B and Mr. C-D get married, their kids are named A-D.  This makes
the second part (D) the normal patrilinear name, and the first part (A) the
corresponding matrilinear name.  I don't think the order is really important;
the patrilinear name might be taken as the "real last" name, but on the other
hand the matrilinear one comes first in the name.
     We could initialize this scheme by all sticking onto the front of our
name the name of the furthest back matrilinear-line ancestor we know.  For
instance, in my case my new name would be Robertson-Andrews, since my
mother's mother's mother's name was Margaret Robertson, and I don't know her
mother's name.
     However, this plays havoc with another idea I like, which is for people
to take each other's middle name when they get married (as I believe John
Lennon and Yoko Ono did).  If each of those is hyphenated, it makes for
pretty long names!
     --Jamie.