“Ze” has entered my vocabulary. Ze will not eliminate “he,” “she,” and “it”; just adds to it. It might even delight my Tejas-Mejicano campesinos who will mistake my use of zee language. Ze does not matter.<\/p>\n
So I wrote in a previous column. “She”, however, does matter.<\/p>\n
It is no longer as repeated as often, but the old Chinese saying, repeated by Mao Zedong and Deng Xiao Peng, was nu ren neng ding ban bian tian, \u201cwomen hold half of the sky.\u201d China today has gone back to being unapologetically patriarchal. The systemic reasons are deep, not the least of which is the universal pattern of naming a child after the father\u2019s ancestral beginnings rather than combining the mother and father\u2019s gifts.<\/p>\n
In my former university classes, I printed my whole name on the board, Jaime Ravelo Vergara, to indicate how my father and mother\u2019s last names are my surnames. When I was in Spain once, I was called Se\u00f1or Ravelo. My name over there was formally written as Jaime Vergara y Ravelo.<\/p>\n
The name in Spain was actually the way Filipino names were given during the Spanish period, still true in many Hispanic countries. The European practice included both parent\u2019s surname when naming a child. It varied on whether the father or the mother\u2019s came first or second. In some English influenced countries, the middle name is the mother\u2019s maiden surname. In some places in the United States, the mother\u2019s surname is dropped. In China, the wife actually had no personality in the husband\u2019s household until she was with a child. The only time a mother\u2019s name shows up is when a combined child\u2019s given name includes that of the mother, more for sentimental reason than proprietary one.<\/p>\n
My children have their mother\u2019s surname as their middle name. However, in some places where the mother is the primary care giver, a child\u2019s surname often takes after the mother, like those of single mothers, or divorced mothers who have sole custody of the children and reverts back to the maiden name as well as renames everyone with her surname.<\/p>\n
Some boutique practices have entered Americana like families where the boys take on the father\u2019s surname, and the girls, the mother\u2019s, or vice versa. In some, a myriad of combinations apply. The hyphenated family name, i.e., Ravelo-Vergara, is common among wives and children.<\/p>\n
The family\u2019s surname after a marriage is also changing. In previous times, the universal practice was for the man\u2019s surname to be adopted, and only after a divorce does the woman have the option to revert back to her maiden name. There are actually eight States in the Union that allows men to change into their wives names in marriage without petitioning the court for the normal process of name change. I once adapted to my Chinese wife\u2019s surname since the Chinese female always retained her maiden name after marriage. My gesture was ignored and stayed unappreciated!<\/p>\n
If patriarchy is deeply embedded in many cultures to the detriment of female roles, conservative forces in Islamic countries insists that Sharia provisions on women\u2019s behavior need to be followed. The kind of literal fundamentalism that dogged the Christian church of my youth is hard to dispel when imposed on members as inerrant scriptural law. Judaism and Christianity have variations of the same theme. The Taliban want women to be subservient. Gang rape in India has exposed a common travesty. But SHE is fighting back.<\/p>\n
\u201cA rose by any other name\u201d served Shakespeare\u2019s audiences well, and was cute with Romeo and Juliet, but no longer. A rose by any other name is a fluke. She wants her name in golden letters in the annals of history, just as much as he does, and has as much equal right to it as anyone. No affirmative action required, just the right to be SHE!<\/p>\n
There were seven revolutions I\u2019ve joined in my life: 1) youth and emotive exuberance, 2) minorities and their civil rights, 3) Third World\u2019s independence from imperial and colonial designs, 4) university vs. multiversity without a cognitive overview, 5) global business against protectionism and entrenched patrimony, 6) the rise of local men and women, and 7) women\u2019s rightful place in humanity\u2019s leveled field.<\/p>\n
The ethos of youth now pervades fashion and there is nothing more disconcerting than to watch a grandma in jeans trying to look like a teenager. Minorities no longer wait under the corporate table to catch droppings. They insist on sitting around the table of life\u2019s feasts with the rest of the crowd. Third World\u2019s fight against imperial and colonial designs is harder to shake. Constitutional monarchies, an anachronism, still keep the aristocrats in England and the elite in Thailand in power. Universities try to keep things together, though pyramidal hierarchy still define tenure rather than flatbed swirling networks of lively intelligences. Globalization is a monster, though it shook the roots of privileged economic monopolies. The rise of local people is wreaking havoc around the word. My daughters have gone way beyond \u201cGod is a girl!\u201d<\/p>\n
The We shall overcome chorus is still playing at my house.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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