Journal Articles

Children’s Surnames, Moral Dilemmas: Accounting for the Predominance of Fathers’ Surnames for Children

---

This content analysis examines online accounts of choices of marital and child surnames to understand the predominance of exclusively patrilineal surnames. I demonstrate how surnaming processes present the classic tension between commitment to self and others as moral dilemmas of self versus family, children, and spouse. Social and cultural mechanisms create an either/or exclusive framing and a false dichotomy where women’s selves and others’ needs are incompatible. I also show how some parents reconceptualize family, children, and expectations for men and women, which helps reconfigure dilemmas into a both/and inclusive framework and permits outcomes integrating self, family, children, and partnership. This study illustrates how maintaining a system that promotes giving fathers’ surnames to children as the only proper choice feeds the inertia of micro- and macro-structures that reflect and reinforce gendered differences in moral responsibility regarding self-sacrifice for family, children, and spouses.

---

Availability

No copy data

Detail Information

Series Title

Gender & Society

Call Number

-

Publisher

: sage publisher., 2010

Collation

-

Language

English

ISBN/ISSN

08912432

Classification

-

Content Type

-

Media Type

-

Carrier Type

-

Edition

Vol. 24 no. 4, August 5, 2010. pp. 499-525

Subject(s)

Gender
Family
Culture
Social Psychology

Specific Detail Info

-

Statement of Responsibility

-

Other version/related

File Attachment

Comments

---

You must be logged in to post a comment