拒绝随夫姓，日本女性的平权之路

TOKYO — Japan’s Constitution promises gender equality, and the prime minister says he wants a society where all women can “shine.” But many women say it is hard to do that when they cannot even use their own surnames.

东京 —— 日本宪法承诺性别平等。日本首相称，他希望在日本社会，所有女性都能“发光”。但是很多日本女人称，这一点很难做到，她们甚至不能用自己的本姓。

Under a Japanese law that dates to the Meiji era, more than a century ago, all married couples must use one surname. In theory, a couple may choose either the husband’s or the wife’s last name, but in practice, 96 percent of women assume their husband’s.

根据一项可以追溯到100多年前的明治时期的日本法律，所有夫妻必须用一个姓。理论上，他们可以选择用夫姓或妻姓，但在实践中，96%的女性随夫姓。

Recent court rulings indicate that the law is unlikely to be softened anytime soon, despite rising criticism.

最近的一些法庭裁决表明，这项法律不大可能很快出现松动，尽管它已招致越来越多的批评。

Yoko Uozumi is happily married with a 4-year-old daughter. Two months ago, she took a job in the photo framing business where her husband also works and decided to use only the surname that she was given at birth.

羽澄洋子(Yoko Uozumi，音)婚姻幸福，有个4岁的女儿。两个月前，她在丈夫工作的相片装裱公司找到了一份工作，她决定只用自己出生时的姓氏。

Uozumi, 36, said she did not want customers to confuse her with her husband, Shigeru Otsuka, as most employees are known primarily by their last names in Japan.

现年36岁的羽澄说，她不想让顾客把她和丈夫大冢茂(Shigeru Otsuka，音)搞混了，因为在日本，人们大多只以员工的姓氏相称。

Using her birth surname went beyond convenience. It was also a declaration of empowerment.

用自己的本姓不只是为了方便，也是在宣布自己的自主权。

“I feel more independent,” Uozumi said. “I feel more who I am.”

“我感觉更独立，”羽澄说，“感觉更像自己。”

The choice she made, however, is not available to all Japanese women. This month, a Tokyo District Court declined to grant a high school teacher’s request to use her original name at work.

不过，不是所有的日本女性都能像她那样自己做决定。本月，一家东京地方裁判所(Tokyo District Court )拒绝了一名高中教师在工作中使用本姓的要求。

That decision came after Japan’s Supreme Court ruled in December that the law did not violate the constitution or place an undue burden on women because an increasing number of employers now permit women to use their birth surnames professionally.

去年12月，日本最高裁判所(Supreme Court)裁定这项法律不违宪，没有给女性增加不必要的负担，因为现在越来越多的雇主允许女性在工作中使用自己的本姓。

Critics were disappointed by the Supreme Court decision because it did not strike down the legal prohibition against separate surnames for married couples, leaving it to the Parliament instead.

批评者对最高裁判所的这项裁定感到失望，因为它没有取消禁止夫妻使用不同姓氏的法令，而是把这个问题留给了国会。

Among democratic countries in the developed world, Japan ranks low on gender equality in health, education, the economy and politics. Despite recent high-profile examples, women hold very few powerful positions in politics or business, while many working mothers complain that day care is inadequate.

在发达民主国家中，日本在卫生、教育、经济和政治领域的性别平等上比较落后。尽管最近出现了一些引人瞩目的例子，但女性在政界和商界极少占据高位，与此同时，很多职业母亲抱怨日托服务不完善。

The marital naming law, supported by many conservatives who believe that women belong predominantly in the home supporting their husbands and families, is seen by some as another vestige of discrimination against women in Japanese society.

很多保守派支持夫妻同姓法，认为女性主要应在家里支持丈夫和家人，但有些人认为这项法律是日本社会歧视女性的一个遗留现象。

In the Tokyo District Court case, the three judges, all men, ruled that the teacher’s employer, a private school in Tokyo, could not be compelled to let her use her birth surname at work. Citing surveys that show about a quarter of women use their original surnames in the workplace, the court said doing so was “not deeply rooted in society.”

在东京地方裁判所的那起案件中，三名全是男性的法官裁定，不能迫使那名教师的雇主——东京的一家私立学校——允许她在工作中使用本姓。裁判所称，调查显示，只有四分之一的女性在工作中使用本姓，所以这种做法“在社会中并非根深蒂固”。

The plaintiff, who has remained anonymous in the publicly available court documents, declined an interview request through her lawyer. In court filings, the teacher, described as recently married, said students and colleagues knew her by her given surname. She asked to be allowed to continue to use it on letters home to parents, attendance records and report cards.

原告在公开的法庭文件中匿名，她通过律师拒绝了采访要求。在法庭文件中，这名新近结婚的教师称，学生和同事是以其本姓认识她这个人的。她要求继续在致家长函、考勤簿和成绩单上使用自己的本姓。

In the United States, where women may legally keep their surnames after marriage, there is still a strong social convention among heterosexual couples for wives to take their husbands’ names. Even the highest estimates show only one in five U.S. women keeps her surname when she marries.

在美国，法律允许女性在婚后使用本姓，但在异性夫妻中，妻随夫姓依然是一种根深蒂固的社会传统。据最乐观的估计， 只有五分之一的美国女性婚后保留本姓。

“Naming is really one of the last socially approved kinds of sexist behavior," Laurie Scheuble, a sociologist at Pennsylvania State University, wrote in an email.

“随夫姓真的是最后一些得到社会认可的性别歧视行为之一，”宾夕法尼亚州立大学(Pennsylvania State University)的社会学家劳丽·朔伊布勒(Laurie Scheuble)在接受邮件采访时写道。

In Japan, advocates for women, including lawmakers across the political spectrum, say they simply want women to make their own choices about their names.

日本的女性支持者(包括政坛各派别的立法者)表示，他们只是想让女性自己决定用谁的姓。

“I don’t want to make a law where every couple has to use two different names,” said Kimie Iwata, president of the Japan Institute for Women’s Empowerment and Diversity Management. “But I want the society to make a law that is generous to everyone and accepts diversity.”

“我不想制订一项法律，要求所有夫妻必须使用不同的姓，”倡导女性赋权的21世纪职业财团(Japan Institute for Women’s Empowerment and Diversity Management)的会长岩田喜美枝(Kimie Iwata)说，“但我想让这个社会制订一项对所有人宽容、接受多样化的法律。”

While campaigning recently for the leadership of the opposition Democratic Party, Renho Murata said she wanted to help change the marital naming law. (Murata goes simply by the name Renho, and her Twitter handle is @Renho-sha, using her birth surname.)

最近在竞选反对党民主党领袖一职的村田莲舫(Renho Murata)称，她想帮助改变夫妻同姓法(村田只用自己的名字莲舫，她的推特账户是@Renho-sha，用的是自己的本姓谢[Sha])。

Seiko Noda, a member of the House of Representatives from the governing Liberal Democratic Party, said she had advocated the right to separate surnames for a quarter-century. “We lawmakers have to destroy this wrong practice,” Noda said, lamenting that many of her fellow Liberal Democrats did not care about overturning the law.

野田圣子(Seiko Noda)是执政党自民党(Liberal Democratic Party)国会众议员。她说，25年来，她一直倡导夫妻使用不同姓氏的权利。“我们立法者必须消灭这种错误做法，”野田说。她哀叹很多自民党党员对废除这项法律不感兴趣。

Noda’s husband, formerly Fuminobu Kimura, took her last name.

野田的丈夫原名木村文信(Fuminobu Kimura)，婚后随了她的姓。

“Whenever he has bad luck, he always complains, ‘Oh, it’s because my surname changed,'” Noda said. She said he now supported an overhaul of the marital naming law. “He understands how much burden women had to go through,” she said.

“只要他碰上坏运气，就会抱怨说，‘哦，那是因为我改了姓，'”野田说。她表示，丈夫现在支持彻底废除夫妻同姓法。“他理解女性承受了多少负担，”她说。

Public opinion polls show a significant shift in views on married couples using a single surname. In 1976, close to two-thirds surveyed by the Justice Ministry said the law was fine as is; that had dropped to just over one-third in 2012.

民意调查显示，民众对夫妻使用同一姓氏的观点发生了很大变化。1976年，近三分之二的司法部调查对象称，这项法律没有问题。到2012年，这一比例已降至三分之一多一点。

In the absence of legal reform, some couples choose not to legally register their marriages, even though women in such relationships have fewer legal protections.

由于没有进行法律改革，有些夫妻选择不进行婚姻登记，尽管在这种关系中，女性得到的法律保护更少。

Mizuho Fukushima, 60, a member of the upper house of Parliament from the Social Democratic Party who has repeatedly proposed a revision of the single-surname law, said she had remained in a common-law marriage for nearly four decades with Yuichi Kaido, a lawyer with whom she has a daughter.

现年60岁的福岛瑞穗(Mizuho Fukushima)是社民党(Social Democratic Party)参议员。她多次提出修改夫妻同姓法。她说，她和身为律师的丈夫海渡雄一(Yuichi Kaido)的事实婚姻存续了近40年，他们有个女儿。

“When I met him, I was Mizuho Fukushima, and my identity is Mizuho Fukushima,” she said.

“我遇见他时，我叫福岛瑞穗，我的身份就是福岛瑞穗，”她说。

A younger generation of working women say their original surnames carry professional clout that they do not want to lose when they marry.

年轻一代职业女性称，她们的本姓具有职业影响力，她们不想在婚后失去它。

“My name is my brand,” said Miyuki Inoue, 28, who works in sales at a human resources consulting firm. She married three years ago but continues to use her original surname at the office.

“我的名字就是我的品牌，”28岁的井上深雪(Miyuki Inoue)说。她在一家人力资源咨询公司的销售部工作。她三年前结婚后，继续在工作中用自己的本姓。

“I don’t want to waste the trust and good reputation that I’ve built in my career,” she said.

“我不想浪费我在事业中建立起来的信任度和良好声誉，”她说。