hyphenated last names

[cellio]

Idle question:

Yesterday someone asked me if my husband and I have the same last name (we don't), and then asked why we didn't combine the names with a hyphen. We rejected that pretty much out of hand; I just don't care for it.

The practice has been around long enough that people who were born with hyphenated last names are now, potentially, marrying each other. I assume that no one hyphenates the hyphenated names, but I wonder what the most common practice is: keep your own, both take one set, or ditch all the hyphens in favor of something simpler?

Comments

[figmo.livejournal.com]

almeda took her husband's last name when she got married because she was tired of her hyphenated last name.

The Spanish have a proud tradition of handling long, hyphenated last names. I forget the algorithm, but they at least have one.

The one case of hyphenation I liked was one I'd heard of (friends of friends) where one's name was "Primo" and the other's was "Fine." They're now the "Primo-Fines," which makes everyone who knows them giggle.

In two cases couples I knew wound up going with a new last name. johno and chriso are one of those couples. He identified with his mother's family, and she had some ancestors with that last name, so at their ceremony, they announced their new last name to lots of whooping and cheering from his relatives. It was adorable.