
Ask HN: Are you required to give a child a last name? - Glyptodon
After some recent submissions to do with the DNF list and people have packages held up and such, some have been suggesting that you should give kids generic names instead of unique names and so on.<p>I&#x27;m wondering what happens if you just don&#x27;t give someone a last name? What happens?<p>I assume it&#x27;s legal in the US at least, but I guess you just can&#x27;t do business with most companies?<p>It seems like it&#x27;d be great for privacy, though. Name your daughter Daisy or something (no last name), and nobody will ever find them on Google...
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Mz
I think Cher legally changed her name to only "Cher." I suspect if you google
her, you can find her.

~~~
dalke
Also the magician Penn. See
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_legally_mononymous_peop...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_legally_mononymous_people)
for a few more.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk%3AMononymous_person](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk%3AMononymous_person)
says: "having passport issued with a single name is not at all uncommon,
especially for naturalized Americans from Asia"

See also
[http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=118360](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=118360)
and [http://ask.metafilter.com/176533/What-are-legal-aspects-
of-c...](http://ask.metafilter.com/176533/What-are-legal-aspects-of-changing-
ones-name-to-a-mononym-or-employing-multiple-legal-aliases) .

Quoting from
[http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudenc...](http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2008/07/talula_does_the_hula_from_hawaii.2.html)
:

> 6\. Koriander, with no last name, apparently chosen because of Rosa Linda
> Ferner's "attraction to a name that sounds appropriate for her work as an
> artisan." Just fine, a New Jersey judge ruled in 1996. [In re Application of
> Rosa Linda Ferner to Assume the Name Koriander, 685 A.2d 78 (N.J. Super. L.
> 1996).]

~~~
chc
You're thinking of Teller. His partner's name is Penn Jillette.

~~~
dalke
Indeed! PEBCAK. :) Thanks for the correction.

------
Zigurd
> _Name your daughter Daisy or something (no last name), and nobody will ever
> find them on Google..._

Or "Zigurd"

D'oh!

------
nodata
patio11 [http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-
programmers-b...](http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-
believe-about-names/)

~~~
a3n
Like so many things, there's how we think things should be, there's what the
law seems to say, and then there's what happens to specific individuals at
specific places with a specific instantiation of judges and bureaucrats. Local
conditions always apply.

In the United States, and likely other areas, people mostly _think_ you have
to have at least a first and a last name. That belief is increasingly
expressed through software and bureaucracy. If it ever became a legal issue,
either by the mononymed person asserting their rights (or their parents doing
it for them), or by some bureaucrat insisting that they toe the line, then it
would end up depending on the whims of any involved judge and how badly
you/they wanted whatever service you were trying to get (including, these
days, buying an airplane ticket, where your SSN name has to match your Drivers
License name and the name on the card that you buy the ticket with, because
DHS).

As a parent, I would give my kid two names, first and last, because I wouldn't
want to force this issue on them for mere iconoclasm. If you have some
_strong_ personal, religious or cultural beliefs, well, go ahead. But it's
probably not your kid's fight.

I changed my name in the late eighties from First Middle Last, to First,
through a name change order obtained through an application and then going
before a judge. I'm certain that the local bureaucracy let it pass because of
the nature of the local bureaucracy, and that other jurisdictions would not
have allowed it, probably based purely on whim.

In the following twenty plus years, I have taken the position of being
flexible. I still have an SSN card with just First on it, but I am no longer
First according to SSN, because 9/11 and DHS. SSN now mails my documents to
First Unk (or maybe the other way around, I don't care and don't remember).

I always try to be First, but often end up falling back to First First, or F.
First. The IRS gladly accepts my check associated with my SSN number every
year, and I always fill out their form with First in their last name field,
which they have so far accepted.

I don't really care, I know who I am, and no one who knows me calls me
anything but First. Sometimes new people call me Mr. First.

It's not something I care to fight about. I would never saddle my kid with
that fight. Your choices are certainly your own.

When my son was born, about ten years after I changed my name, I named him
HisFirstName First. So we would both have the same family name. :)

