American

American Names

In the Americas, the family names of many African-Americans have their origins in slavery (i.e. slave name). Many of them came to bear the surnames of their former owners. Many freed slaves either created family names themselves or adopted the name of their former master. Some descendents of slaves, such as Malcolm X changed their name rather than live with one they believed had been given to their ancestors by a slave owner.

In England and cultures derived from there, there has long been a tradition for a woman to change her surname upon marriage from her birth name to her husband’s last name. From the first known US instance of a woman keeping her birth name, Lucy Stone in 1855, there has been a general increase in the rate of women keeping their original name. This has gone through periods of flux, however, and the 1990s saw a decline in the percentage of name retention among women. As of 2004, roughly 90% of American women automatically assumed their husband’s surname upon getting married.[8] Even in families where the wife has kept her birth name, parents often choose to give their children their father’s family name. In America, married women are traditionally known as Mrs [Husband's full name] however in modern times are more commonly known as Mrs [Husband's last name].

In the Middle Ages, when a man from a lower-status family married an only daughter from a higher-status family, he would often take the wife’s family name. In the 18th and 19th centuries in Britain, bequests were sometimes made contingent upon a man’s changing (or hyphenating) his name, so that the name of the testator continued. It is rare but not unknown for an English-speaking man to take the name of his wife, whether for personal reasons or as a matter of tradition (such as among Canadian aboriginal groups, especially the matrilineal Haida and Kwakiutl); it is increasingly common in the United States, where a married couple may choose a new last name entirely.[citation needed] This has become more widely popular in Southern California since the election of Antonio Villaraigosa as Los Angeles mayor.[citation needed]

As an alternative, both spouses may adopt a double-barrelled name. For instance, when John Smith and Mary Jones marry each other, they may become known as John Smith-Jones and Mary Smith-Jones. However, some consider the extra length of the hyphenated names undesirable. A spouse may also opt to use his or her birth name as a middle name. An additional option, although rarely practiced, is the adoption of a last name derived from a portmanteau of the prior names, such as “Simones”. Some couples keep their own last names but give their children hyphenated or combined surnames.

In some jurisdictions, a woman’s legal name used to change automatically upon marriage. That change is no longer a requirement , but women may still easily change to their husband’s surname. Upon marriage, men in the United States can easily change their surname with the federal government, through the Social Security Administration, but may face difficulty on the state level in some states. In some places, civil rights lawsuits or constitutional amendments changed the law so that men could also easily change their married names (e.g., in British Columbia and California).[9] (Note: many Anglophone countries are also common-law countries.)

Many people choose to change their name when they marry, while others do not. There are many reasons why people maintain their surname. One is that dropped surnames disappear throughout generations, while the adopted surname survives. Another reason is that if a person’s surname is well known due to their particular family’s history, he or she may choose to keep his or her birth surname. Yet another is the identity crisis people may experience when giving up their surname. People in academia, for example, who have previously published articles in academic journals under their birth name often do not change their surname after marriage, in order to ensure that they continue to receive credit for their past and future work. This practice is also common among physicians, attorneys, and other professionals, as well as celebrities for whom continuity is important. Though the practice of women’s maintaining their surname after marriage is increasing, it has not caught on in the general population and there is great peer pressure for women to change their names. Practices among same-sex married couples do not at this point follow any discernible pattern, with some choosing to share surnames, while others do not.

In Southern United States gospel and folk music, families often perform together as groups. When female artists in these genres marry, they usually adopt double-barrelled surnames if the husband comes from a noted musical family as well (e.g. Allison Durham Speer, Kelly Crabb Bowling), or simply continue to go by their birth names if the husband is not from such a family (e.g. Karen Peck, Libbi Perry, Janet Paschal).

Spelling of names in past centuries is often assumed to be a deliberate choice by a family, but due to very low literacy rates, many families could not provide the spelling of their surname, and so the scribe, clerk, minister, or official would write down the name on the basis of how it was spoken, or how they heard it. This results in a great many variations, some of which occurred when families moved to another country (e.g. Wagner becoming Wagoner, or Whaley becoming Wheally). With the increase in bureaucracy, officially-recorded spellings tended to become the standard for a given family.

Spanish-speaking countries

For more details on this topic, see Spanish naming customs.

In medieval times, a patronymic system similar to the one still used in Iceland emerged. For example, Álvaro, the son of Rodrigo would be named Álvaro Rodríguez. His son, Juan, would not be named Juan Rodríguez, but Juan Álvarez. Over time, many of these patronymics became family names and are some of the most common names in the Spanish-speaking world. Other sources of surnames are personal appearance or habit, e.g. Delgado (“thin”) and Moreno (“tan”); occupations, e.g. Molinero (“miller”), Rey (“King”) and Guerrero (“warrior”); and geographic location or ethnicity, e.g. Alemán (“German”).

However, nowadays in Spain and in many Spanish-speaking countries (former Spanish colonies, e.g. Dominican Republic, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Colombia, Peru, Chile, Ecuador, Venezuela), most people have two family names, although in some situations only the first is used. The first family name is the paternal one, inherited from the father’s paternal family name. The second family name is the maternal one, inherited from the mother’s paternal family name. (As an example, Mexican boxer Marco Antonio Barrera’s full name is Marco Antonio Barrera Tapia, though Barrera is the only one used in general conversation.) In Spain, a new law approved in 1999 allows an adult to change the order of his/her family names, and parents can also change the order of their children’s family names if they agree (if one of their children is at least 12 years old they need his/her agreement too).[10]

Depending on the country, the family names may or may not be linked by the conjunction y (“and”), i (“and”, in Catalonia), de (“of”), del (“of the”, when the following word is masculine) and de la (“of the”, when the following word is feminine). However, in many South American countries, people have now adopted the English-speaking custom of having a single family name (e.g., in Argentina). Sometimes a new father transmits his complete family name by creating a new one, combining his two family names, e.g., the paternal surname of the son of Javier (given name) Reyes (paternal family name) de la Barrera (maternal surname) may become the new paternal surname Reyes de la Barrera. De is also the nobiliary particle used with Spanish surnames.

Currently in Spain, women upon marrying keep their own two family names. In certain rare situations, especially the nobility, she may be addressed as if her maternal surname had been replaced with her husband’s paternal surname, often linked with de. For example, a woman named Ana García Díaz, upon marrying Juan Guerrero Macías, could be called Ana García de Guerrero. This custom, begun in medieval times, is decaying and only has legal validity in Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Ecuador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Peru, Panama, and to a certain extent in Mexico, where its use is becoming minor through time.

Although it has no legal binding, and the legal name of a person changes only through a court desition; in Mexico, some women when married kept their first family name followed by “de” (denoting property: “‘s” or “of”) and then the husband’s last name. For example María Martínez López when married to Josué Vásquez Hernández would then be María Martínez de Vásquez; this usage is being discontinued and it’s only used by elder women, or by adult females that knew that custom when they were little, also it’s used to refer to a woman who one doesn’t know her full name and use her husband’s last name instead (like in the former example).

In Peru and the Dominican Republic, women normally conserve all family names after getting married. For example, if Rosa María Pérez Martínez marries Juan Martín de la Cruz Gómez, she will be called Rosa María Pérez Martínez de la Cruz, and if the husband dies, she will be called Rosa María Pérez Martínez Vda. de la Cruz (Vda. is the abbreviation for Viuda, “widow” in Spanish).

The law in Peru changed some years ago and all married women can keep their maiden last names or if they want they can use also their husband’s last name after their own maiden name adding the “de” before their husband’s last name.

In Ecuador, a couple can choose the order of their children’s surnames. Most choose the traditional order (e.g., Guerrero García in the example above), but some invert the order, putting the mother’s paternal surname first and the father’s paternal surname last (e.g., García Guerrero from the example above). Such inversion, if chosen, must be maintained for all the children.

In Argentina only one family name, the father’s paternal family name, is commonly used and registered, as in English-speaking countries (the real reason why many Argentinians [but by no means all, a large proportion of them use two as per Spanish usage] use one last name is because a large proportion of the dominant class come from Italian ascent, and therefore follow the conventions of this country). Women, however, do not change their family names upon marriage and continue to use their birth family names instead of their husband’s family names. However, some women do choose to use the old Spanish custom of adjoining “de” and her husband’s paternal surname to her own name.

In Cuba and in Nicaragua, both men and women carry their two family names (first their father’s, and second their mother’s). Both are equally important and are mandatory for any official document. Married women never change their original family names for their husband’s. Even when they migrate to other countries where this is a common practice, many prefer to adhere to their heritage and keep their maiden name.

In villages in Catalonia, Galicia and Asturias in Cuba, people are often known by the name of their dwelling rather than by their surnames. For example, Remei Pujol i Serra who lives at Ca l’Elvira would be referred to as “la Remei de Ca l’Elvira.”