David, Regarding names, I agree with Susan M. that this will be applied in different ways depending on cultural traditions. This is one of many areas where the notion of unity with diversity really comes to play.
When my husband and I were consulting, before we married, regarding my married name to be, we had several issues to consider: 1) my professional work already done under my maiden name of Brill, 2) my strong desire for a family name that would linguistically and symbolically reflect the unity of our family, 3) my desire to honor my parents through my name (last name from my father and my middle name Berry from my mother's family) and my own ethnicity and culture through my names: Brill being Jewish and Berry reflecting our southern Anglo-American/Scotch-Irish/Cherokee heritage, and 4) my husband's desire to not change his name which had already been changed for him when he was brought to this country as a boy. Other issues entered into our choice. We decided that I would follow the same tradition of his mother's family when she married, going from Josephina Sanchez Coello to Josephina Sanchez de Ramirez (deleting her mother's family name Coello, keeping her father's family name of Sanchez and adding her husband's father's family name). I know this sounds a bit complicated, but it really is pretty simple. Traditionally in Mexico, children have two last names, their father's and mother's (both coming from the grandfathers on each side respectively). Males would keep both names; women would drop their mother's family name and replace it with the paternal name of their husbands. So I went from Susan Berry Brill to Susan Berry Brill de Ramirez. To shorten it a bit, I just use my middle initial: Susan B. Brill de Ramirez. For publications, I use the full name wanting to honor the ancestry of my mom's family. Since she chose to give me a family name for my middle name (instead of a more generic middle name), I want to honor that choice. So, it seemed that the Mexican tradition of my husband's family seemed the perfect choice for us. I'm glad that we were able to go through this process. We learned more about each other, our families, and cultures. Were my husband not Mexican, I would have needed a different but similar solution (probably a hyphenated Ramirez-Brill). Anyway here's the story of the Berry (southern) Brill (Jewish) de Ramirez (Mexican spouse). This worked for us. Regards to everyone, Susan Dr. Susan B. Brill de Ramirez, Professor of English Bradley University, Peoria, IL 61625 [EMAIL PROTECTED]; (309) 677-3888; fax (309) 677-2330 -----Original Message----- From: David Friedman [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Saturday, August 02, 2003 11:52 PM To: Baha'i Studies Subject: Last names I'm just wondering if there is anything in the Faith, like perhaps a letter, bearing on the issue of what name to take when one marries. Is there an ideal, like the woman taking the man's name, or having a hypenated name? Occasionally the woman gets her husband to change, apparently to help bring about the equality of men and women. I don't know that that would be a valid reason. The problem with hypenated names is that the generations that follow could keep adding names, so that eventually one might have ten names. That would be a little silly. Regards, David _________________________________________________________________ Surf the net and talk on the phone with Xtra Jetstream @ http://www.xtra.co.nz/products/0,,5803,00.html ! ---------- You are subscribed to Baha'i Studies as: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Baha'i Studies is available through the following: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://list.jccc.net/cgi-bin/lyris.pl?enter=bahai-st news://list.jccc.net/bahai-st http://www.escribe.com/religion/bahaist (public) http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED] (public) ---------- You are subscribed to Baha'i Studies as: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Baha'i Studies is available through the following: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://list.jccc.net/cgi-bin/lyris.pl?enter=bahai-st news://list.jccc.net/bahai-st http://www.escribe.com/religion/bahaist (public) http://www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED] (public)
