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Dan: Hello and welcome to 6 Minute English.
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I'm Dan and joining me today is Neil. Hi Neil.
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Neil: Hi there, Dan.
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Dan: You're a married man, Neil. When you were wed,
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did your wife change her family name?
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Neil: Yes she did.
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Dan: Was that her choice?
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Neil: Oh yes. She didn't like her old name,
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so for her it was a win-win. How about you?
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Dan: Well, my wife wanted to keep her surname,
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but was forced to adopt mine
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because that was the law where we got married.
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Neil: Would you have thought about taking her name?
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Dan: That's what we're talking about in this
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6 Minute English. A husband taking a wife's
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name after marriage. All that,
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six related words and our quiz question.
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Neil: OK. Let's have the question.
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Dan: In which country has it been forbidden
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since 1789 for a citizen to change their name
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legally, even after marriage?
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Is it a) Japan, b) France or c) Turkey
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Neil: I'm going to go for b) France
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Dan: And we'll see if you're right later.
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Now, traditionally in the UK,
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when a man and a woman get married,
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the woman takes the man's family name.
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And this replaces her maiden name.
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Neil: A maiden name is the surname a woman had
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before she was married. This all dates
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back to the Norman invasion of England, back in 1066.
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They introduced the idea that when
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a woman married a man, she became his property.
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As a result of this, she took his name.
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Dan: These days, many women elect to keep
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their maiden name upon marriage or combine it
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with their new husband's in some way, sometimes
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by making the name double-barrelled.
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Neil: A double-barrelled name is two names.
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that are connected by a hyphen, such as Jones-Smith
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Dan: However, a growing number of couples
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in western culture are doing it differently.
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When they get married,
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the husband elects to take the wife's surname.
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Neil: In a BBC article about surnames and marriage,
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Rory Dearlove, formerly Rory Cook,
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talks about why he decided to take his wife's surname.
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He said that he wasn't really attached
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to his name anyway.
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To him it didn't make any difference.
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Dan: Well, he's not alone.
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A recent study of 2000 UK adults by Opinium,
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a strategic insight agency, suggested that one in ten
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millennial men, currently between 18 and 34 years old,
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fall into this category.
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Neil: Charlie Shaw, a Tibetan Buddhist meditation
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instructor, who took his wife's name when they
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married last year, said that it was an opportunity
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to acknowledge the unseen patriarchal
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bias and sexism in our society.
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Dan: Patriarchal means 'controlled by men'
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and a bias is the unfair support or opposition
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to a person, thing or idea.
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Neil: Many traditional societies were patriarchal.
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But modern UK society is less like that.
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Everyone is meant to be equal.
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Dan: Ah yes, but that's the unseen part.
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And there's the social view of things too.
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Rachel Robnett, a researcher at the University of
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Nevada surveyed a number of people
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in the US and UK, and found that the husbands of
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of women who keep their maiden names are viewed
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as 'feminine', while the women are believed to
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'wear the trousers'.
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Neil: If you 'wear the trousers' in a relationship,
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it means you 'have the control
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and make the decisions for both people'.
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Dan: I wondered about that,
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so I went out into London
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and asked people what they thought
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about a man who took his wife's name
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when they got married. Here's what they said.
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Woman: I don't think it's a bad idea at all.
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My dad's 55 and he took my mother's surname.
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If people want to do it,
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then all the power to them.
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Man: It's each to their own really.
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It doesn't hurt anybody. And it's no different from
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a woman taking a man's name.
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Woman: The only reason I think that anybody
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should take someone else's surname
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if just for the creation of a family unit.
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But if it's just out of principle, I don't agree.
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Dan: It seems that the people I talked to
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are comfortable with the idea.
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Neil: Yes. Most said that people are free
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to do what they want. One woman even mentioned
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the creation of a family unit.
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Dan: A unit is a group of people living
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or working together. A typical family unit would be
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two parents and some children.
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Well, that answers that question.
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People don't seem to mind who takes who's name.
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Neil: Speaking of questions.
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How about our quiz question?
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Dan: I asked you in which country
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it's been forbidden since 1789
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for a citizen to change their name legally,
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even after marriage?
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a) Japan, b) France or c) Turkey
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Neil: And I said b) France
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Dan: And you were spot on as usual, Neil.
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Neil: Let's take a look at the vocabulary, shall we?
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Dan: First we had maiden name.
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This is a woman's family name before she is married.
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My mother refused to give up her maiden name
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to my father when she got married.
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Neil: Then we had double-barrelled.
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A double-barrelled name is two names
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that are joined by a hyphen.
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Can you think of any famous examples?
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Dan: Well, there's the Duchess of Cornwall
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Camilla Parker-Bowles for one.
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She's married to Prince Charles -
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next in line to the English throne.
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Then we had patriarchal.
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If something is patriarchal,
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it is controlled by men.
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The feminine equivalent is matriarchal,
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controlled by women.
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Neil: Then we had bias. A bias is unfair support
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or opposition to a person, thing or idea.
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Dan: Many fans are biased in favour
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of their football team.
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Then we had wear the trousers.
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If you wear the trousers, you have the control
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and make the decisions for both people.
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Do you wear the trousers in your marriage, Neil?
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Neil: Oh, we both wear the trousers in my marriage,
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thank you Dan. Then we had unit.
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A unit is a group of people living or working
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together. Like the BBC Learning English team... or unit!
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Dan: And that's the end of this 6 Minute English.
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Don't forget to check out our Facebook, Twitter,
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Instagram and YouTube pages.
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And we'll see you next time. Bye!
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Neil: Bye!