Consensus on using Maiden Names

Oh ya we do have people marring cousins and aunts and ucles ete all with the same last name. Happens a lot with Smith , and Jones and check our Fernald/Fennel/Fennell. They did that all the time. We have a family in town Ludwign luviska and Merrifiew( Spelling may not be correct) They are so mixed up together that you need all the last names to keep them straightThen there's the Champa's and Nickols.That another mess. So I think all names should be included.

By the way the families I just mentioned are very well known in town and everyone who knows them or are related just laughs it's all off as well Barbara so and so Married so and so but then the other Barbara so and so who married another one and ok who's sister is she. and we all just laugh.What else can you do.Saugus is like that everyone knows everyone. One old Towny who found out may mother was a Parker, once a Parker always a Parker even if your birth name is Loubris , like mine is, and she said are you related to Frank Parker and I had to think about and yest that;s my uncle Ernest( Frank Ernest) Oh she said The north Saugus and I thought she was going to say Parkers no she said the North Saugus Indians. She';d no. She was married to a Hawkes( thats Adam hawkes' line] and they were North Saugus all the way.But then my great grandmother, the Indian, knew a lot of dirt about people up ther. I know I digress a litttle but my point being names mmaiden or otherwisw are important . I t is your identitiy. You ar not your husbands wife or father's child .You are you and you are important, if only to yourself. Always hold your head high and be yourself, at least that's what my mother and grandmother taught be!

You know I don't understand the logic in giving a man a maiden name. They don't have one! They always have the name they were born with, unless o course adopted and that's a whole diferent animal!

"You know I don't understand the logic in giving a man a maiden name. They don't have one! They always have the name they were born with, unless o course adopted and that's a whole diferent animal!"

That's a western (primarily Romance Languages) standard.
There are many countries that have quite complex naming standards, with different names for different times in their lives, among other possibilities.

On a global scale (like geni's big tree is supposed to work on), these biases to our way of naming, is grotesque at best.

Jason P Herbert

For the record, many spanish speaking countries do not comply with our system of naming.

In Costa Rica, for example, it is custom to use one last name from the father, and one last name from the mother.

Had the Costa Rican tradition held true in my family (my mother's side is part Costa Rican), for instance... my full name would be: Jason Peter Herbert Zumbado.

My father's last name first... my mother's last name second.

This kinda works with geni... if we use the last name field for both last names... but it's still considered a workaround at best.

Jason P Herbert

Hi Jason:

The Costa Rican system you described is pretty much descended from the Spanish system, which is not only still in use in Costa Rica, but also Chile. A person doesn't change their name from birth until death - they have the paternal "apellido" and the maternal "apellido" which is used in the formal version of a person's name. Frequently, though, I've seen the paternal "apellido" stand alone, even as a first reference in news reports here (President Sebastian Pinera, for instance). I'm sure our Latin American curators can add more insight to this.

I do know that this system was also in use when New Mexico was part of Mexico. I've run into ancestors that made use of this exact system - and they ran into problems when the Anglo-American system of using only one last name was foisted on them. Some were given the paternal apellido, others were given the second last name as a family name (the maternal apellido). That has made tracking through New Mexico genealogy somewhat interesting, particularly around the mid-1800s (the US southwest was annexed in 1848).

Hi Judith:

Actually, I have run into a couple instances where the male has changed last name at marriage, which technically should give them a "maiden name". However, I've seen it handled as a concatenated name (Richmond Webb, for instance). The usual reason for this is to ensure an inheritance for the family's children, particularly when the wife's family appears to have a strong enough claim on the family's land at the end of the husband's life. (As an aside, a few generations down, Richmond Webb re-evolved back to just Richmond.)

There was also a Calvert in my tree that changed last names around the time of his marriage, but this seems to have been more the result of a family quarrel, the details of which I've yet to find out about (they don't seem to have survived to present day, sadly).

I have several male relatives that didn't use their birth name or took different surnames. In my family, there were four brothers (Lamont) who changed their last names after fleeing Scotland during clan wars. Each brother took a different surname (Young, Green, White, and Sitlington) from the others, I imagine to give themselves more anonymity.

My gggf didn't go by his scoundrel father's surname after his mother left the marriage. My maiden name would have been Wellman if it weren't for that occurence. Instead I was raised a Hardy. I haven't used the maiden names for men, but I see the logic for it.

Jason! Good to see you back in form.

"The Costa Rican system you described is pretty much descended from the Spanish system, which is not only still in use in Costa Rica, but also Chile."

Interesting... are those the only two countries still adhering to the "old" naming system?

"A person doesn't change their name from birth until death - they have the paternal "apellido" and the maternal "apellido" which is used in the formal version of a person's name."

Yeah... I rather like that system... as it can make tracing lineage much easier. Pity the rest of the world failed to adopt it.

"Frequently, though, I've seen the paternal "apellido" stand alone, even as a first reference in news reports here (President Sebastian Pinera, for instance). I'm sure our Latin American curators can add more insight to this."

I suspect it's just easier to use an informal version than to use the full formal version.
Just as much of the English language has "degraded" into a much less formal, and much more personal language system, I suspect most other countries are seeing a similar change.

Jason P Herbert

Shmuel: LOL... I never left... I just don't post much anymore.

My blood pressure needed a vacation ;-) .

Jason P Herbert

Judith: I see you still fail to grasp the point. Allow me to put it in language a 3rd grader should understand.

The world does not revolve around America and it's allies.

This American bias you exude from every post is sicking in it's extremity.

Whatever you call it, birth name, maiden name, it means the same damn thing; the name you were given at birth.

You have ancestors, long dead, who would not have appreciated your vain attempts to "Anglicize" their names, whether you realize it or not.

Trying to apply modern American standards across the ages and across international lines is bigotry in it's most repulsive form.

Jason P Herbert

For the record: I am American.

Though I have never been as ashamed of those words as I am now.

Jason P Herbert

Jason , insulting me is very childress on your part, I guess the 3rd grade reference is for you. Have a condesending attitude is not particularly becoming to anyone. I totally grasp the fact that are geni not all Americans but since I am one, I tend to think like one ! That's just how it is and considering 90 percent of my original ancestors did speak English and were here by the 1630. Some arr. by 1700 and a very few who spoke French , Flemish and Dutch arr. around 1878 or so all managed to learn the language and fit in while still keeping there ethnic background in tact.In fact I think they may have spoken some English when they got here. My Native American side o course spoke a variety of native languages and out of necessity learned English. they were never were ashamed of who they were and never covered it up. A birth names mean exactly that. A maiden name is the birth name of a female. As far as trying to apply modern American Standards across international lines, the same could be said other countries and culture too. It works both ways. I am not a bigot just proud to be an American as I am sure you are proud of whatever ,you are. If you don't like it you can lump it ! I have as much right as you to express my opinion without being insulted.

I missed you second post as I was replying to your first post. Jason I am sorry you are ashamed of being an American just because I have a different opinion than you. I am not ashamed of being American because of your statements. I was always taught to be myself and be proud of who I was and where I came from and my family ete come what may. Hold your head up high, help others if you can and keep going.

I don't think the Geni community ever will come to a consensus about how to use maiden names. Sadly there are to many people on Geni with little or no genealogical experience to get a consesnsus.

I just want to point out. Genealogists always use the names at birth as a persons main name, and it doesn't matter wether the person is male or female, so maiden name is written in the last name / surname field of that person, not in the maiden name field.

So if you want to get more accurate hits with merges and duplicates, I will advice to write names this way. If you are interested in sharing your genealogy with others through gedcom-files, or get gedcom-files from other genealogists, it's very smart to write names this way. It will make your family research and matching of same persons a lot easier.

When name at birth are used, it will also facilitate easier searching for ancestors. You will then allready have the last name of (most commonly) their father. Later in life, the name after marriage is shown by the husbands last name, and if you are researching descendants, it is easy to look for the fathers last name. So name after marriage is usually not necessary to use on the females that take their husbands last name.

This system works in both western and eastern Europe, all of the Americas among the immigrants, and in Africa among the immigrants. More or less in all times.

I don't know enough about native Americans, native Africans, middle east, and asian people to say for sure if this will work for their last names.

Well, Remi, that's how I thought it worked. I think we should make sure the birth name is always on there and in the case of most men it's the only name they have. There are some exception o course! Then you will need more than one name. I the case of women, their birth/maiden name as well as there married /divorced/widow name, whatever one wishes to call it and this depends on her circumstances, and o course if she acturally took husbands name, should all be included. Makes it easier to trace her tree and everyone connected with it easier to find. This is the way any professional and more professional gen, I know dos it. It's the way it's done in many reference books ete. Basely that's the point I was making along with other points. it's the same with using the Enlish version of say William the Conq. or using his orginal French name. Both are correct depending what part of history we are referring too. Myself to make everyone happy and correctly also, use both, because he was known as both. On the subject of the previous incident with another Geni member, I have been going over my many post ( I deleted a couple that were duplicates. Must have double clicked them!) and I don't find anything wrong in what I said. In-fact I was trying to stand up for certain groups of people I have known in the past who were being slanted for whatever reason good or bad by other people I have known. I have always felt there should be room enough for everyone to live freely with or without each and have their own life the way they want it, as long they don't hurt anyone. Anyway I think you said it beautifully.

Hi Remi,

The problem is one of the English language, actually. The word "maiden" ***always*** refers to a woman. It causes cognitive dissonance and gender identity crises for English users to use it for a male person. :) :)

So if, for example! The name fields are re-labeled in Geni:

Maiden Name: Name at Birth
Last Name: Name at Death

Perhaps we move beyond the language issues and into a more international genealogical standard. This may also take care of the case of "naturalized" names from other languages and alphabets, I believe.

P.S. My experience searching for female ancestresses for the last 400 years in English is that it is not easy at all, sadly, to find them based on father's last name. I really need both names (the husband's last name and the father's last name).

This debate has been going on since the beginning of Geni. The sad thing is that there should be no debate. Fields in a database are there to provide more information than you would have without it. The problem is that Geni decided to call the name of the field "Maiden Name" instead of "Name at Birth"- even though the latter is the way that the vast majority of people on Geni use it.

Solve that mis-named field problem and the whole debate goes away.

Judith... I concur with this statement and am waiting, eagerly, for Geni to adopt this...
" If we are going to what the professionals do then we have to change system of birth, death and marriages date.. Day should always go first, then month, then year and on the subject of years we shout be able to put in about before, after and this is an example,' 1654/1655 or whatever, since in many instances that is how the professionals do it as they do not have exact date. The way we're doing can cause a major problem in merging. Some people pick one date and other's the other date and then we don't agree."

All of latin America uses the Spanish system. It has been a problem for me in Panama because they insist on using my maiden name for official docs, titles etc... and then get disturbed when it does not match the info on my passport. and the disturbance translates into big time problems for me.

I think we should do away with maiden name altogether, just have birth name, adopted name, and married name. That would pretty much cover it all, would it not?

Judith, I agree with you completely. We should have the name fields "First name", "Middle name", "Last name" and "Other names" or "Name variations". In the Last name field we should always enter a persons birth name. In Other names/Name variations there should be several options in a pull down menu, where people could enter Married name, Name in census, etc. And ofcourse the possibilty to enter as many variations of names as you wish.

Erica: If the word "maiden" is giving the english speaking world problems, then lets get rid of it. Call the field "Other names" or "Name variations" and lets make a pull down menu with several different choices, like "Marreid name", Name in census", Name at death etc. Then we will have:

Last name: Name at birth.
Other name: All other name variations

This will be like the way genealogists do it, the way offline genealogical database programs do it, it will work with gedcom-files, and it will work internationally.

No, David, the problem is not that Geni decided to call the field "Maiden name" instead of "Name at birth", the problem is that Geni didn't call the field "Other names", and made it possible to enter several name variations that ofcourse all would be searchable. Name at birth should be in the "Last name" field. That's how this problem should be solved, and it would work for all of us.

Sally and Judith. I agree with you about how the dates should be written, and I also agree on the subject of about, before and after. I would also suggest the possibility to use between and then enter 2 different years or dates, for which the event happend between. I have seen several offline genealogical database programs with this opportunity.

Remi, could you add this to the new" Feature Requests" section of the new helpcenter, post a link here and ask people to support it by clicking "Me too!"

http://geni.zendesk.com/home

"Erica: If the word "maiden" is giving the english speaking world problems, then lets get rid of it."

My point exactly. I'm glad you finally see it. :)

I still like the convention of "name at birth" and "name at death" as those are the starting and ending points in an individual's life story, and have equal importance in a story arc and in an ancestor hunt.

In some cases the "other" names are just acquired along the way, but the records left behind start, at least in the United States and working backwards in time from oneself, with "name at death."

Sally

I wouldn't agree to the term "adopted name" because that to me is specific to "adoption" scenarios and does not cover "naturalized" name etc.

In general the idea of "other names" fields is working for me, with flexibility built in (i.e., naturalized name, adopted name, language change name, perhaps spelling variations? etc.).

I really though would like to see two core fields:

name at birth
name at death

"Between" dates has already been requested as a Geni application enhancement. You can "me too!" here:

http://geni.zendesk.com/entries/431901-expand-date-entry-options-to...

Yes Judith

You raised a good point that I hope can be addressed somehow.

In English it is a convention to write out a married woman's name with their maiden name in the middle position; for instance, the famous abolitionist, Lucretia Coffin Mott.

Which of course is not her "legal" middle name.

"Isabel" is my middle name as per my birth certificate. I use it in geni because there does exist at least one other person with the name Erica Howton in the world. But I have fielded inquiries from users --- so, are you a member of the Isabel family? :)

Remi's suggestion is, to my mind, of course the most logical - but I'd always assumed that doing that would involve changing thousands of pre-existing profiles on Geni, which is why it hasn't been done?

Bjørn, added to Reqeusts here: http://geni.zendesk.com/requests/1023

Remi, you must have posted a help request, only viewable by you, instead of a feature request.

Here is the sub-level:
http://geni.zendesk.com/forums/337266-feature-requests

I do however notice that Pam have a specific request to maiden name, so if you post a new you can refer to that too.

http://geni.zendesk.com/entries/432709-change-maiden-name-field-lab...

Bjørn / Remi

I think the point is that you have to "Suggest an idea" at http://geni.zendesk.com/forums/337266-feature-requests/entries/new

rather than "Submit A Request" at http://geni.zendesk.com/requests/new

Acturally Erica the three sons I mentioned . those are there legal middle names just like my grandmother was Winnette Ives( Cookson ) Parker. Ives was her middle name. Cookson, her maiden/birth name and Parker her married name. A lot families did that and still do. I have a friend who's whole family still does that. In my case I always say Mc Carthy is my Divorced name. I an half joking when I say that but it is true I am divorced and never went back to Loubris legally. I like to use both. and as long as I still legally am using Mc Carthy I can stick whatever I want in front of it.