When Surname matters..

 

We all know that surname is the last name that reflects the identity of our family. Whether you are taking admission in school, Job, filling up of format in passport or in marriage,

We need to use our surname because surname really matters in our life.. I would n't like to mention here in searching long source of history of surname rather its impact in our societal equilibrium.

In the society, we might be accustomed to go through rules for governing our behaviour & meet our social needs. Right from childhood to adult stage, everywhere kinds of institutions are there in fulfilling our needs for eg- family, marriage,education,religion, govt etc. These social institutions aimed at balancing equilibrium at social structure.

But will you consider surname as the causative factor in the creation of polarisation that is actually destroying the balance? well in this case you might argue about the importance of surname that indicates the source of our origin, from where have we come, the name of the region etc.

O.K that's fine. But these may be known in other ways instead of using surname. You might ask that why am I in the against of existence of surname system. 

 It is because it is affecting our lives within the parameters of social structure. It is because it acts as catalyst in destroying cohesion among various social groups, increases distances among us & creates a hierarchy system of placing us & creating limit setting factor for us.

Let us find out how it is destroying our today's life.

Class/caste & racism:-

Social stratification on the basis life style living /occupation/rituals-- all these indicates to the caste system. In India it still persists & no one can deny it .

If your surname is singh that means you are khatriya(warrior),Banerjee/chatterjee belongs to(Bhramhin). Taking birth in a Bhramhin's family one thus acquired the legitimacy in ascertaining the role as a priest to earn through worshipping. Other surname holders can't have the right to enter into this institution of economy with license for earning.

According to 2011 Census, there are 16.6% SC(Scheduled caste), 8.6% ST(Schedule Tribes). Apart from these, there are people , called OBC(other backward class) consisting of 52% of Indian population(as Mandol commission). These OBC enjoys 27 % reservation in public sector employment & higher education.

When you have surname belongs to any of these categories, you would be entitled to receive facilities right from scholarship in education to employment & age relaxation as a job seeker.

As per institutional policy these facilities are being provided to remove bias & promote equality but in reality it is a retrograde system of the constitution which describes equality among the citizens of the country. Considering present context, there is time coming soon to have reservation system for the surname consisting of General Category who are struggling for their survival existence.

Certain peoples with surnames changes & reaches to the class in the social hierarchy.

Now, if you come to racial ground, I want to cite an example of influence of surname over it.

in the Uk, a researcher while submitting a thesis(racism in UK,2013),conducted a semi structured interview among 32 peoples. 29 out of 32 participants seemed to be found in changing their surname simply as their surname reflected racial identity.

According to "Tableau Public", some of the racially homogeneous surnames, used by minimum 100k people per name--- are-

1. Most White:- Walsh(94.5%), Meyer(94.8%)

2. Most Asian:- XU(98.3%), ZHU-(98.2%)

3. Most Native American:-Begaye-(95.5%), T.Sosie-(95.0%)

In the early 20th century,African American sounding names & surnames holders were facing more job discrimination. Earlier in 200 census, total 163,063 people were counted & it had been found that 90 % of them belongs to African American, choosing surname of "Washington" in order to ascertain their freedom.

It is perhaps in the process of asserting of freedom, more than 1000 joined in the civil rights demonstration with the rally-" Get your knee off our necks".

Family unity VS community dis integrity:-

Family is our primary institution where we by our surname can know the name of our ancestors.

families that are related to each others is supposed to be within a clan. In using surname we might get proud in the unity of our family for e.g joining by our extended family.

But simultaneously it has a bad impact towards the integrity of our community set up. Using surname provide barriers in social interactions. It decides whether it would be allowed or in what extent in case of social interactions & bonding. Definitely it goes against social grooming & thus maintaining cohesion within various groups in our community.

Polarization:-

To day, using of own surname even after marriage no doubt reflects our attitude based on broad mentality,education & empowerment. But this surname system & its using had put mankind in the confused state from where it really becomes difficult for us to follow our both-old as well as existing system. Following of surname of either parents enhances possibility of gender bias- towards creation of patriarchal & matriarchal structure.

When children are proud in carrying surname of both parents, then also after her marriage she would have to go for adding & I just can't think where it might stop after few generations.

Don't you think this surname system thus acts as causative factor towards polarisation? Does not it remind us the difference between male & female existence & need for empowerment /capacity building /male- chauvinism/Feminism terminologies for the sake of persistence of our egoism?

Our foundation of morality are thus affected by the use of surname system & its inevitable impact is felt by us towards our urge in concentrating self-ism rather group-ism.

This self-ism is detrimental towards sustaining of even institution like- joint family where societal integrity is far way in our though process.

Honour Killing:-

have you gone through the Homicide case(May'202o) of Mahendergarh district in Chandigarh where a boy belongs to yadav surname was killed as he had an affair with girl using Brahmin surname, or

the kanpur killing case (Dec'2019) of 21 year girl because she got married out of her caste. She was killed in-spite of the fact that she had a court marriage with the boy from outer caste.

O.k Lets take a tour around the world. In 2012, Noor Al-melki (20 years) of pheonix was killed by her father Faleh-Al- Maleiki(Ref: CBS-48 hours mystery).

Pakistan is the country where honour killing is widely reported. Other countries are- Bangladesh, Brazil ,Canada, Egypt,Iran, Iraq, Morocco, Italy & even in UK or USA.

As per UN Estimation there are around 5,000 numbers of women & girls killing per year in the name of honour killing.

All these honour killing or shame killing attitude is derived from the concept of violating family norms & hence to be punished by the family /group members. This actually

Though steps had already been taken by the supreme court(in India) to prevent this shameful act & this is punishable offence under sec-307,308,120-(A + B) etc but attitude still persists in our society within us due to using of surname , claiming to be within clan on the basis of surname & continuation of practice of the prejudice of passing our surname Generation wise.

More persistence of using our surname in any extent , more will be the tendency towards gender discrimination & violence against women.

Can you ignore the impact of our surname system as one of Major causative factor towards anti-social thinking of 'Honour Killing"?

Thus being conferred to rule the society on the basis of power dynamics that person achieved due to the dynasty is actually based by surname system in our societal structure.

We, thus have our succession system of transferring automatically health,wealth ,power & privileges. All classification/sub classification of our clan/sub clan or clan & family system as institution are having its impact ultimately in key social institutions like - Education ,Employment & Marriage.

Inequality in the society due to quota system/reservation policy without proper monitoring , increase rate of violence against women, inequitable class system by using alphabets in surname for getting privilege in education-- all these persists in our life---

               "When surname matters ".