The Knitting Revolutionary

The name thing

Running around the Guardian website, I stumbled across this.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/gender/story/0,,2201073,00.html

I've had this conversation with several people (I know Adele will be hopping up and down at this point in time) about the whole "what do I do with my surname now that I'm divorced" thing, so this article really struck a chord - and made me giggle lots, which is always a good thing ;-)

I've had three surnames. My first was my father's, and I had this name from birth until age 8(ish) when my mum married my stepdad. Things were looking pretty rosy for them, and us kids took his surname, so I toted that one around for a while until I got married at 23, and then took my ex's name.

I said to Luke when we divorced, "changing your name is a pain in the arse, do you mind if I just keep yours?" to which he laughingly replied "ok". I mean, really, I've had the name for 10 years now, and I'm just as attached to it, or not-attached as the case may be, as I am my other 2 names.

So I considered going back to one of my old names (nah, no point), keeping Luke's (mmm... it'll do for now), or taking a completely random or cool name (Wollstonecraft? inspired, but...). I gave up on the whole idea, put it in the too-hard basket, and just learned to live with having a Lebanese surname even though I'm fairly obviously caucasian. Mostly what I dislike is having to explain to people why that is - people *do* ask, and I don't really feel comfortable dodging or fully answering the question.

It seems that there's a third option: no surname at all.

Hm.

How *does* one detach themselves from a name when there is no new name to replace the old one? And how does one go about this without looking like a bit of a twit?

I have much thinkage in which to immerse myself. Hm, and hm again.

Just the way it's done

I believe that one of the most annoying explanations someone can give for the question "why do I have to do something this way?" is "because that's the way it's always been" (or any other variation including "because it's our policy" and "because that's the way it's done around here"). It is a non-explanation, it explains absolutely nothing and leaves the enquirer in a worse situation than before, not just ignorant but frustrated as well. It leaves very little room for improvement of procedure, and no chance for innovation or problemsolving to be used with the purpose of making whatever-it-is work better.

This article was published in the Guardian on the 15th, and the Canberra Times on the 20th of this month:

http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,2191130,00.html#article_continue

"Women in developing countries find it easier to break through the so-called glass ceiling than their colleagues in the west, according to a global study by PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The firm interviewed more than a hundred business people across eight countries, including China, India and Germany, for the report on women's economic participation for the Women's Forum held in Deauville, France, over the weekend.

It said: "Our discussions with interviewees suggested that in developed countries, cultural stereotypes and perceptions may represent greater barriers to full economic participation by women than in many of the developing countries.... (click link for full article)

I found it absolutely fascinating for a couple of reasons - firstly my continuing interest in and support of feminism, and secondly because of the sociological aspect of it. Even though people in developing countries seem to have a built in sense of superiority, we can learn something really valuable from this - women can actually do these jobs, and do them well.

Why doesn't it happen (very often) in countries like Australia? Well, apparently, it's just the way it's always been done.