DNR Proposes Increasing Fees For Hunting And Fishing Licenses, Madison’s Bilingual Entrepreneurial Center, Taking Your Husband’s Name

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• DNR Proposes Increased Fees For Hunting, Fishing, And Silent Sports

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  The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources says its budget shortfall could be fixed temporarily by raising fees for hunting and fishing licenses, in addition to other activities. We talk to a former DNR secretary about these proposals and how they could affect outdoor recreation in Wisconsin.

• Bilingual Entreprenurial Center To Open In Madison

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  A new project of the Latino Chamber of Commerce in Madison will provide bilingual support and guidance for Spanish speakers hoping to open their own businesses.

• New Dual-Language Business Center For Startups Opens In Monona

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  A Madison-based nonprofit has launched a new initiative to provide better resources for Latino entrepreneurs.

  Mayra Medrano, president of the Latino Chamber of Commerce of Dane County, said the new dual-language Emerging Business Development Center is meant to help Latino entrepreneurs with office space, access to capital, resources, mentor support and technical tools to help them build a business.

  The chamber, founded in 2003, has its home office at Centro Hispano on Badger Road in Madison, but it didn’t have space to help people they way the new center will be able to.

  “What we really wanted is to have an actual physical space where the people coming in seeking for help can actually stay a while and use some of the resources that we have at the Latino Chamber of Commerce,” Medrano said.

  Being in the right physical space is very important as Latino entrepreneurs consider what they need for their business, she said.

  Right now, the chamber is helping four Latino entrepreneurs, but Medrano hopes the organization can grow to help 10 entrepreneurs in the next couple years.

  “It really will be a center dedicated to one-on-one service, so we really want to start with a handful of entrepreneurs and slowly grow it so that we have our capacity as well to help them be successful,” she said. “We really want to ensure that we’re doing everything right from the start.”

  The center will be an incubator-type environment, so the entrepreneurs involved will have their own desks and internet access. They’ll be able to host meetings there as well.

  Medrano said a lot of people become members of the chamber of commerce for the sole purpose of mentorship. People come in with skills and experience, looking to help other entrepreneurs as they can.

  “We really have a great business resource community in our area, and we are just the connector,” she said.

  The center will hold an open house on from 5 to 7 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 26 at the Chase Bank Building in Monona.

• Why Aren't More American Women Keeping Their Given Name?

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  Laurie Scheuble began studying martial naming back in the early 1990s.

  Over the decades, the sociology professor found only a slight increase in the number of American women who decided not to take on the last name of their husband. The strength of the longtime tradition shocked her.

  “When I started this, I thought surely by 25 years from now we’ll be in the 40 percent range of women maintaining their birth surname when they marry. So yeah, I am shocked,” she said.

  “But now, based on what I know, I don’t expect we’re ever going to get much over 15 percent of women keeping their birth surname.”

  Research shows about 8 percent of women in the United States will keep their maiden name after marriage. The number has ebbed and flowed over the years, peaking at around 23 percent in the ’90s.

  “Women who keep their birth surname tend to focus more on things like being a feminist, or their identity. … But women who change their last name tend to really be more interested in the tradition,” said Scheuble, who teaches sociology at Pennsylvania State University.

  She added well-educated women are more likely to keep their surname when they marry, and some choose that route for the practical route of paperwork and other bureaucracy matters.

  It’s a much different story around the globe. In China, women keep their surname when they get married because the culture privileges a father’s lineage, even after marriage.

  In Japan, a 100-year-old law dictates all married couples choose one surname. Almost 96 percent of the time, Japanese couples choose the husband’s last name, although women today are challenging that law in court, according to recent reporting in The New York Times.

  And while women have a range of choices here in the U.S., Scheuble said that doesn’t necessarily make things easier, and the decision has a long-reaching impact on children and personal identity.

  Hyphenated names prove to be even more unpopular than women keeping their maiden names. Scheuble said only about 1 percent of women will elect to bridge names after tying the knot.

  “Hyphenating is really hard because people just automatically chop off one of the names and our system is not set up for people with hyphenated name,” she said. “You don’t fit into the little dots when you fill out forms. It’s a really hard naming option, I think.”

  Shocked as she may be about what the numbers show, Scheuble said the marital traditions of women taking on their husband’s name is strong in American culture.

  “It’s how women demonstrate love for their husbands. It’s how we identify family, everybody has the same last name,” she said.

  Name changes remain a loaded issue. Human rights lawyer Amal Clooney received backlash when she announced she would be taking on the last name of her husband, actor George Clooney.

  Scheuble said the social norms will likely remain controversial as the fight for gender equality goes on. These lessons are taught at an early age, she said, recalling how her young daughter in diary entries and drawings would attach the last names of boys she had innocent crushes on to her own first name.

  “We don’t socialize boys in the same way,” Scheuble said. “Boys are not trying out their first name with some girl’s last name. They do often expect that spouse will take the last name, and they think the women will be more committed to the marriage when they do so.”