Lots of "standard" solutions -- my family went with "give them both", but I know families that did "give everyone one parent's surname", and one family that gave presumed-boy-children the mother's surname and presumed-girl-children the father's. (Heterosexuals EVERYWHERE.)
This is basically everyone I knew growing up. We all had parents with different last names and our fathers' surnames. I think there is more variety in my circles for more recent kids but that is still the most common.
My children have their father's surname and not mine. This is mostly unexamined cultural assumptions on our part, and was part of why I changed my own name for nearly ten years before changing back again.
Most children I know in opposite-sex couples have the father's surname, but then usually so does the mother. I know a same-sex couple where the children have double-barrelled surnames. I know one family where the first two children have the father's surname and the third child the mother's.
We didn't really interrogate our assumptions around names for the firstborn, and there was a strong family tradition about the name of the firstborn child which we fell in with.
By the time of the secondborn I remember considering giving them my (original) surname and reverting to it myself, but I wasn't quite sure enough to go against the "obvious" choice to go with the same surname as their sibling. It took me a couple more years to go back to my own name, and that's more than enough bureaucracy: I don't feel strongly enough to want to change secondborn's name now.
Interestingly (well, that's what I call it because otherwise I get mad), neither the children having different surnames nor them having hyphenated surnames is allowed in my country :-/
That is the kind of thing that makes me go wow. We have to *record* the child's name with the state, but up to us what the name *is*.
It's social pressure / cultural assumptions that go on ... while it was my mother's generation who really pushed women keeping their own name on marriage, most women still seem to change their name but enough don't that it's not unusual. Even my changing-name-back-without-divorce has mostly got a bit of puzzlement rather than "that's not allowed".
Just in case that wasn't clear, it's okay to pick either the mother's or the father's name - you just can't use one for one child and another for the next. Generally, Germany has capital-R Rules for names, including first names.
Most women still change theirs over here, too. I didn't. I don't get many comments on that, at least...
(forgive me for being nosy, if this topic annoys you too much, feel free to ignore)
How does that work for half-siblings or blended families? Does a remarriage "reset" the surname issue? For that matter, what about children whose parents aren't and don't get married?
Basically, when you get married, you choose a "family name", which can be either partner's surname. The other spouse doesn't have to take it, but that's the name any children born from that marriage get. (It's allowed to defer this decision until the first child is born, which is what my husband and I did).
So it's clear what surname kids will get at birth for married couples For unmarried couples, it's a bit more complicated - it is possible to choose the father's name, though. I have no idea what happens if you then later get married and choose the other name as the family name. I'm sure there's some law for that as well, probably just telling you that you can't...
As for divorce/remarriage, children just keep their names. The surnames can be changed, but don't have to - my husband doesn't share his name with his mother/stepfather/half-sisters he grew up with, because he didn't want to change it.
We went with my surname. Double-barrelled wasn't really practical.
When we got married, Susan didn't want to change her surname to mine and I was quite happy with that. This turns out to have been an amazingly wise decision, given the number of immigration-related forms for both the UK and US that wanted proof of any previous names - all that paper we saved by not having previous names.
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jack
no subject
Date: 2016-03-06 01:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-03-06 03:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-03-06 04:26 pm (UTC)Most children I know in opposite-sex couples have the father's surname, but then usually so does the mother. I know a same-sex couple where the children have double-barrelled surnames. I know one family where the first two children have the father's surname and the third child the mother's.
We didn't really interrogate our assumptions around names for the firstborn, and there was a strong family tradition about the name of the firstborn child which we fell in with.
By the time of the secondborn I remember considering giving them my (original) surname and reverting to it myself, but I wasn't quite sure enough to go against the "obvious" choice to go with the same surname as their sibling. It took me a couple more years to go back to my own name, and that's more than enough bureaucracy: I don't feel strongly enough to want to change secondborn's name now.
no subject
Date: 2016-03-06 08:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-03-06 09:12 pm (UTC)It's social pressure / cultural assumptions that go on ... while it was my mother's generation who really pushed women keeping their own name on marriage, most women still seem to change their name but enough don't that it's not unusual. Even my changing-name-back-without-divorce has mostly got a bit of puzzlement rather than "that's not allowed".
no subject
Date: 2016-03-06 10:03 pm (UTC)Most women still change theirs over here, too. I didn't. I don't get many comments on that, at least...
no subject
Date: 2016-03-06 10:16 pm (UTC)How does that work for half-siblings or blended families? Does a remarriage "reset" the surname issue? For that matter, what about children whose parents aren't and don't get married?
no subject
Date: 2016-03-06 10:38 pm (UTC)So it's clear what surname kids will get at birth for married couples For unmarried couples, it's a bit more complicated - it is possible to choose the father's name, though. I have no idea what happens if you then later get married and choose the other name as the family name. I'm sure there's some law for that as well, probably just telling you that you can't...
As for divorce/remarriage, children just keep their names. The surnames can be changed, but don't have to - my husband doesn't share his name with his mother/stepfather/half-sisters he grew up with, because he didn't want to change it.
no subject
Date: 2016-03-06 04:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-03-06 07:42 pm (UTC)When we got married, Susan didn't want to change her surname to mine and I was quite happy with that. This turns out to have been an amazingly wise decision, given the number of immigration-related forms for both the UK and US that wanted proof of any previous names - all that paper we saved by not having previous names.