All of Australia was behind Ash Barty when she took home the coveted title of Wimbledon champion on Saturday last week but it was a picture of the world number one standing in front of the women’s roll of honour that had many questioning a small detail – the naming convention for previous winners.
Barty, much like the majority of past Wimbledon winners was called by the honorific ‘Miss’. Writer Paul Dennett in The Roar that when he looked up the name of Barty’s idol, Evonne Goolagong Cawley, he was surprised to find the “name inscribed next to 1980 was ‘Mrs R. Cawley’. Momentarily puzzled, I suddenly realised that the ‘R’ must stand for the name of Goolagong-Cawley’s husband. And indeed it does: his name is Roger Cawley.”
He goes on to write: “It is the same story for 1981, where the winner is listed as ‘Mrs J.M. Lloyd’. Who? It took me a second and then I realised this was actually Chris Evert.”
Chris Evert who had been a Grand Slam singles championship winner eight times and was the world No. 1 singles player in 1974, 1975, 1976, 1977, 1978, 1980, and 1981, had been reduced to the 'Mrs' of a man who she later went on to divorce.
The naming convention brought up for many the sexist roots of giving women the honorific of 'Miss' or 'Mrs' based on the their marital status.
As some people pointed out if Barty’s opponent in the finals match, Karolina Pliskova, had won her title would have been 'Mrs'.
Interestingly in the Wimbledon men’s roll of honour there is no Mr in front of the names. It seems strange then that the women are still being assigned a title based on whether they are married.
Many extraordinary women in the past have had their actual names disappear due to naming conventions that linked them firmly under their husband’s surname.
As was : “To us, she has always been Amelia Earhart, but there was a time when The New York Times called her Mrs. Putnam in newspaper articles, linking her identity to that of her husband, George. She wasn’t the only one: Frida Kahlo was sometimes called Mrs. Diego Rivera; Coretta Scott King was Mrs. Martin Luther King Jr.; and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis was Mrs. John F. Kennedy.”
Just as I could never imagine calling Frida Kahlo, Mrs Diego Rivera, I could also never imagine calling myself a Mrs under my husband’s surname. In fact I kept my surname after getting married, and my children have both my husband and my surnames.
There are still some women who prefer to use the title Mrs and it is still employed in traditional contexts. While many women like me have begun to use ‘Ms’, the honorific can have sexist connotations.
As was when Meghan Markle became engaged to Prince Harry, the only reason she was called Ms Markle by the Royal Family was because she had been previously divorced.
But for many, 'Ms' is the best we’ve got. The feminist activist Sheila Michaels brought it into consciousness of feminists in the 1960s and '70s, and since then it’s been used by many women as a replacement for 'Miss' or 'Mrs'.
While a number of people have said it's time we changed the honorifics for women by not giving them a title based on whether they are single, married or divorced, there are others who want us to stick to tradition and keep the naming convention. If it’s been this way for over a hundred years, why go changing things they say?
It’s unlikely these terms, which are so deeply embedded in our culture, will be changing any time soon. Until then it’s up to each woman to choose what title she would prefer to go by. And as for Wimbledon, until players bring up the sexist tradition regarding the honorifics on the roll of honour, we will likely see 'Miss' and 'Mrs' on the board for many years to come.
Saman Shad is a freelance writer.
