Erin Coulehan, Salon – December 2, 2015
It’s an interesting paradox: we admire and trust women like Hillary Clinton and Amal Clooney when it comes to carving out what’s considered to be a modern woman. Powerful, intelligent, capable — yet chastise them for their decisions about their names, as if that has any effect on their competency. The decision to take a husband’s last name doesn’t really change the person as much as other people’s perception of her. This might be why 30 percent of women married within the last year have opted to keep their maiden names.