An ironic fad: The commodification and consumption of tattoos

An Ironic Fad: The Commodification and Consumption of Tattoos M A RY K O S U T Unfortunately, MTV put us on the map with celebrities getting tattooed. Today it’s chic . . .. (‘‘Tattoo Lou’’ Rabino, qtd. in McCabe 125) Whenever we imitate, we transfer not only the demand for creative activity, but also the responsibility for the action from ourselves to another. Thus the individual is freed from the worry of choosing and appears simply as a creature of the group, as a vessel of the social contents . . . (Simmel, qtd. in Levine 295) A MERICA HAS BECOME A TATTOOED NATION. IF YOU TURN ON YOUR television, open a magazine, or go see a movie, you will likely encounter a tattooed body. Actors, models, musicians, and idolized athletes proudly herald the mainstreaming of a previously marginalized and historically underground practice. By the end of the 1990s, tattoos became visible in the public sphere, finding a home in the comfortable cultural landscape of suburban America where there is an abundance of consumers with discretionary income. The popularization and commodification of tattoo is confirmed by a plethora of books and toys marketed to the youngest consumers such as Tattoo Barbie, The Sesame Street Talent Show: Tattoo Tales, Around the World in Tweety Time: Tattoo Storybook, and the Power Puff girls’ Ruff n’ Stuff Tattoo Book, that include tattooed figures, color-in tattoo kits, and The Journal of Popular Culture, Vol. 39, No. 6, 2006 r 2006, Copyright the Authors Journal compilation r 2006, Blackwell Publishing, Inc. 1035 1036 Mary Kosut temporary tattoos for kids to apply to their own bodies. New generations of American children are growing up in a cultural landscape that is more tattoo-friendly and tattoo-flooded than at any other time in history. Although there was a short-lived tattoo fad among members of the European and American leisure classes over a century ago,1 the contemporary American tattoo craze has eclipsed it in size and scope. The community of new tattooees transcends age, class, and ethnic boundaries, and includes a heterogeneous population of teenagers and young adults, women, African Americans, Latin Americans, urbanites, suburbanites, white-collar professionals, and the college-educated. Of course, as Margo DeMello (‘‘Not just for Bikers’’; Bodies) has documented, those who make up what could be described as the traditional tattoo population—working class, blue-collar, bikers, prisoners, punks—are also still getting tattooed, but have been carefully edited out of media discourses announcing the elevation of tattoo cultures. The 2001 MSNBC television special, Skin Deep, which examined tattooing and other contemporary body modifications, reported that twenty percent of the American population is tattooed. Although the validity of this statistic is speculative, a 2002 survey conducted by the University of Connecticut produced similar findings. As a result, the profession of tattooing has blossomed, with academy-trained artists venturing into the craft in search of creative work that guarantees a paycheck. In fact, tattooing was listed as one of the top high-growth businesses in the middle and late 1990s (Vail 253). With the ubiquity of tattoo in the media, the growth of the tattoo industry, and a new population of tattoo aficionados, it is reasonable to propose that one in five Americans is imbued with ink. Why has tattoo been adopted across such diverse status boundaries? How can we explain tattoo’s mainstream appeal? To understand tattoo’s popularity in the latter decades of the twentieth century, larger global, cultural, political, and economic trends must be taken into consideration. However, the individual motivations and personal meanings that people ascribe to their tattoos can also provide clues to understanding this phenomenon (see Atkinson (157 – 60); Bell (53 – 8); Irwin (49 – 73); Kosut (79 – 100); Pitts (67 – 84); Sanders (46 – 7; 51 – 2); Sullivan (13 – 23); and Vail (253 – 73)). With this in mind, this article focuses on one piece of the contemporary American tattoo puzzle by exploring the popularization of tattoos An Ironic Fad 1037 within the context of media outlets that shape the terrain of mass culture. Special consideration is given to the entertainment industry broadly defined—television, film, sports, fashion, and music—as it is a primary conduit of popular culture. The content of newspapers and magazines is also analyzed to reveal how tattoos are being reframed in print. In addition to media discourses and entertainment representations, I also examine tattoo as a commodity and as a fad. I argue that the mediation and commodification of tattoo are processes that are interconnected. The prevalence of tattooing in popular culture and the dramatic demographic shift in tattooees indicates that tattoos have mass appeal. Within this context, I explore how the mainstreaming of tattoo relates to the recognition of tattoo as an art form. Mediating Cool One of the obvious indicators that tattoos are a part of the social mainstream is their prevalence in mediated popular culture. The entertainment industry is replete with tattooed personalities—both ‘‘real’’ and fictional. Television programs, including soap operas, sitcoms, and the burgeoning reality genre, present tattooed characters and everyday people who openly display their ink. Similarly, Hollywood films frequently employ tattoos as corporeal signifiers that suggest disenchantment and rebellion. The summer of 2002 blockbuster action film, XXX, featuring the character Xander Cage (played by actor Vin Diesel) as a postmodern action hero best described as an alienated James Bond meets Rambo on a skateboard, is covered with tattoos. The advertising campaign for XXX focused on Diesel’s character’s detached and misanthropic persona, penchant for extreme sports, and heavily tattooed muscular torso and neck. Billboard and newspaper advertisements displayed Diesel’s oversized and distinctively tattooed arm cradling a fragile, helpless beauty. The message for eighteen- to thirty-year-old movie consumers was clear—XXX’s hero is no Roger Moore, he is composedly cool and fierce. He gets the girl, saves the world, and does it with subcultural style. Tattooed characters aside, actors and actresses seem to be just as enchanted with tattoo as the masses. While celebrities like Cher and Johnny Depp are elder tattoo aficionados known to be tattooed before the 1990s, there are other pop stars who have more recently acquired 1038 Mary Kosut tattoos and unveiled them in public, such as Pamela Anderson, Ben Affleck, Christine Ricci, Angelina Jolie, ‘‘The Rock,’’ and Sean Connery. There are even coffee table books like Celebrity Skin: Tattoos, Brands and Body Adornments of the Stars (Gerard) and Tattoo Nation: Portraits of Celebrity Body Art (Ritz), documenting who has what tattoo and what part of the body it is located on. The realm of professional sports is also filling up with tattooed bodies, particularly the fields of football and basketball. For example, it is estimated that fifty percent of the members of the National Basketball Association are tattooed, including such high-status players as Michael Jordon, Marcus Camby, Kirby Puckett, and Shaquille O’Neal (Shields 36). Both celebrities and their audiences have mutually embraced the practice. The fact that many lionized public figures are tattooed may lead some people enamored with celebrity to follow in their path. At the very least, the celebrity tattoo phenomenon contributes to new understandings of tattoo and elevates tattoo’s cultural status. However, as tattoos prevail in popular culture and become increasingly visible, they risk appearing rather banal. In August of 2002, in a television interview on ABC’s Good Morning America, interviewer Diane Sawyer gaily commented on middle-aged actress Carrie Fischer’s brand new celestial-themed ankle tattoo. In a parent – child role reversal, Fischer puckishly quipped that her daughter highly disapproved of her body modification. How much longer can tattoos keep their lingering status as emblems of rebellion if obviously uncool, middleaged women chattily discuss them on a major network morning show owned by Disney? Considered within the context of Birmingham School theories, tattoo status is destined to weaken as subcultural signs eventually exhaust their potential to provoke after repeated exposure through the mainstream media (Hebdige 92 – 4). Just as the original 1970s punk subculture was semiotically pillaged by the culture industry, tattooing is also being gentrified and repackaged as desirable and hip. Previously confrontational visual codes such as spiked and mohawked hair, leather accessories, ripped clothing, safety pins, and now tattoos, often signify trendiness and conformity, rather than rebellion and transgression. Tattoo’s subcultural status notwithstanding, the music industry, arguably a very powerful arbiter of public taste and a ‘‘primary communicative tool for youth cultures,’’ is dominated by tattooed male and female musicians (Seiler 206). Thanks to mass media outlets such as MTV, which rely heavily on packaging a performer’s visual image, fringe and mainstream have become blurred. Tattoos transcend An Ironic Fad 1039 disparate musical genres and artists, from the androgynous neo-Goth Marilyn Manson, to hip-hop and R & B vocalists such as Mary J. Blige and Ja Rule, and contemporary pop singers like Pink and the Dixie Chicks. Regardless of age, social class, or ethnicity, you do not have to look closely to find a tattooed star that appeals to your musical or lifestyle tastes. If the musicians we idolize and sometimes seek to emulate (at least in appearance) have tattoos on their bodies, why not get one ourselves? Twenty-five-year-old Matt admitted to me that he admired and eventually emulated rock icons he revered in his youth: I: Tell me about when you first started thinking about getting a tattoo. M: Well, I mean, the people that I wanted to be like all had tattoos when I was a kid. I: Kid meaning teenager? . . . Who were the people that you wanted to be like? M: Yeah 12 and up. Well I have always wanted to be a musician . . . You know I liked to rock at any early age. You know, I loved it when Guns ’N Roses came out and they had cool tattoos, you know? Even if Matt does not achieve success as a musician, he will at least have signs on his body announcing his long-standing commitment to ‘‘rock.’’ Of course, the positive meanings these signs currently hold may transform over time if Matt decides upon a more mundane or conventional career path. Tattoo’s mainstream status is also illustrated by their usage as an advertising tool for a diverse range of consumer goods. Whether designated as a sign of rebellion, youth, trendiness, or some amalgam of coolness, tattoos assist in selling products—from vodka to cars. Thus, tattoo is used to sell a product and is simultaneously a product to be consumed. Interestingly, one advertising executive came up with the idea of having basketball players don temporary tattoos to hock products. Although NBA officials ruled against athletes using their bodies as living billboards, the Phoenix Suns’ Stephon Marbury said that ‘‘if they’re paying the right money’’ he would consider it (Shields 34). The days of embodied product placement may soon be upon us. In 2001, VISA set one of its television commercials within a tattoo studio, announcing to Generation Xers that you can charge everything on your credit card, including body modifications. Besides the youth culture market, tattoos are utilized in advertising campaigns geared toward more established adults, particularly those interested in 1040 Mary Kosut expensive luxury goods. In a frequently reproduced2 print ad campaign for Versace’s 2002 summer beach collection, russet-skinned, wellslickened models reveal large portions of their bodies from under tiny Versace bathing suits highlighting carefully positioned tattoos. That tattoos are appearing on models’ bodies and are being used to target the present-day leisure classes indicates an elevation in their cultural status. The continued usage of tattoo in advertising campaigns assists in circulating a variety of new images and messages about tattoo into the public’s imagination; it also heralds tattoo as a legitimate and desirable consumer product for all social classes. Consuming Tattoo When I began conducting ethnographic research on contemporary tattoo culture six years ago, colleagues questioned the significance of my project because it appeared to be ‘‘just a fad.’’ They presumed that tattoo was destined to fall out of popular favor just as quickly as the last season’s accessory, shoe or haircut. Considering the forces of the consumer market and the fickleness of public tastes, it seemed like a reasonable assumption. However, unlike hairstyles or clothing, tattoos are not worn upon the body but rather inscribed into the body. Tattoos simultaneously decorate the body and permanently modify it. For this reason, tattooing can be conceptualized as an ironic fad—a popular cultural trend that, due to its permanent nature, cannot be as easily discarded as a pair of jeans.3 One twenty-nine-year-old informant described her tattoo as the ‘‘fad you can’t toss away,’’ predicting that by the time she was a grandmother her ‘‘tattoos will be cool again and I will get cred from my grandkids.’’4 According to social theorist Georg Simmel, the ‘‘element of attraction’’ for any fashionable phenomena lies in its inherently ‘‘transitory character’’ (Levine 303). Simmel theorizes fashion as a distinct social field that includes ‘‘clothing, amusements and social conduct’’ (298). Once the mainstream or majority adopts a particular fashion, whether sartorial or behavioral, it ceases to become fashionable and is discarded for the next obscure trend. As Simmel observes, the nature of fashion is highly contradictory: The very character of fashion demands that it should be exercised at one time only by a portion of the given group, the great majority being merely on the road to adopting it. As soon as an example has An Ironic Fad 1041 been universally adopted, that is, as soon as anything that was originally done only by a few has really come to be practice by all—as is the case in certain portions of our apparel and in various forms of social conduct—we no longer speak of fashion. (qtd. in Levine 302) However, unlike various objects of fashion, tattoo is a resilient and idiosyncratic material cultural form that resists consumer ‘‘throw-away’’ culture. Even if the meanings of tattoos shift, and their present cultural currency declines or exhausts, most tattooed bodies will bear this ironic fad for the course of the life cycle. For some people, the permanence of tattoos contributes to their allure and cultural significance. In considering contemporary tattoo as a consumer product, it is also crucial to make clear that the act of consumption, that is receiving a tattoo, is often a lengthy ritualistic and increasingly medicalized procedure. Depending upon the size, design, and location, getting tattooed can take anywhere from one to two hours for a small flashinspired icon,5 while large and complex images sometimes take eight to twenty hours of work that may extend over the span of a week and involve multiple visits depending on the client’s pain threshold. Most potential tattooees spend some time conceptualizing and considering what the design will be and where it will be placed (public or private location) on their bodies before entering the studio.6 Furthermore, after purchasing the product, the client must follow an after-care regime to promote the healing process and stave off infection. The customer walks away with a wound resembling a severe brush-burn that bleeds, scabs, and eventually peels or sheds away7 over the course of about a week. Even if your product is not visible, you are quickly reminded of your purchase upon bumping into a table, hugging a friend, or turning in your sleep. Because the act of getting tattooed typically encompasses three distinct stages of varying length—preplanning, receiving the tattoo, and after-care regime and healing process—it cannot be compared with the act of purchasing a pair of sneakers, no matter how reflexive and discriminating the consumer. This is because tattoo is a product whose consumption cannot be divorced from its mode of production (Sweetman). As a tattooed person, you are the witness, participant, and life-long bearer of a unique production process; a process in which the producer and consumer unite in complicated exchange that is simultaneously ritualistic, economic/consumeristic, and individualistic. 1042 Mary Kosut Because of the unique manner in which tattoos are produced and consumed, the act of being tattooed suggests an inherent degree of agency that is unlike the consumption of other bodily goods. As Paul Sweetman notes, you can buy and wear an Armani suit as ‘‘pure sign’’ that is, ‘‘in ignorance of the conditions under which the material product was fabricated’’ (64). In contrast, tattoos ‘‘demand one’s presence as producer, consumer and living frame for the corporeal artifact thus acquired’’ (64). The painful and ritualistic tattoo process involving the penetration of the body, coupled with the ongoing live-ness of the tattoo, creates a unique and potentially agentic consumer experience that can last for the duration of the body/product. The act of tattooing permanently reinscribes the living body—thinking, breathing, sweating, wrinkling—with a type of agency that is ongoing and inexhaustible, as compared with the consumption and display of sartorial body modifications that are, by their nature, ephemeral and disembodied. Tattoos invite a level of engagement because they become a permanent addition to the body/self. The unique production and consumption of tattoo challenges arguments advanced in the mass culture debate, particularly Dwight MacDonald’s contention that the mass culture audience are ‘‘passive consumers’’ whose ‘‘participation [is] limited to the choice between buying and not buying’’ (55). MacDonald, as well as members of the Frankfurt School, predicted that the emergence of commercialized and standardized products would usurp all creativity and individuality from the production and consumption process, resulting in a type of collective consumer alienation. ‘‘Imposed from above’’ and ‘‘fabricated by technicians’’ (not skilled artisans or craftspeople) mass cultural products served only the culture industry itself (rationalized, bureaucratized corporations) while exploiting and homogenizing consumers with limited economic and cultural power (McDonald 55). Paradoxically, tattoos serve the culture industry, from Versace to MTV ‘‘VJs,’’ because they help sell products, and of course, are sold as products. Yet the unique process in which tattoos are produced and consumed directly challenges the idea that consumers are zombie-like passive recipients. Just as tattoos are an ironic fad because they are permanently embodied, they are also an ironic consumer product because they resist the mechanization and distance created by the assembly line. Unlike other commodities, tattoos are highly individualistic and personal, as opposed to impersonal factory-produced goods. Even standardized An Ironic Fad 1043 tattoo drawings commonly found on studio walls, as opposed to original, one-of-a-kind tattoo designs, are rendered uniquely idiosyncratic during the application process. The image remains the same, but the artist’s hand and the recipient’s body personalize the product. For this reason, tattoo is a rather contradictory consumer good. Is it a commodity whose value will soon be exhausted, or an inherently creative and agentic postmodern product? Tattoos have clearly undergone a process of commodification; they are not only purchased as embodied status symbols, they are used to sell other commodities. Tattoos are also subject to mediation, particularly through carefully constructed images created by the music and film industries. Even though they have been pulled from their subcultural roots (blue-collar, deviant, underground) and replanted in the mainstream, tattoos still have a certain aura of cool and rebellion about them. This is evidenced in the use of tattoos by the culture industry and their prevalence in a variety of popular entertainment media. These two developments play a role in the mainstreaming of tattoo and the transcendence of class, race, and gender lines among a new generation of tattooees. From Other to Artform: Mainstream Print Discourse What was once the trade of tattoo artists with names like Sailor Bill operating in shipyard alleyways and in amusement park stalls has become craft, if not art . . . (James) Another factor that has led to a change in tattoo meanings is the declaration of tattoo as art in the mainstream print media. As Margo DeMello notes, popular print discourses have contributed to the erasure of early images and meanings of tattoo by recreating tattoo as a middle-class cultural practice with inherent aesthetic value, distancing ‘‘modern tattooing from its working-class history’’ (Bodies 97). In roughly the past five years, there has been a striking similarity in the way that tattoos are described and contextualized by journalists and reporters. While some articles focused on teenagers, women, or celebrities with tattoos, there is one common thread that connects all of them—a differentiation between how tattoos used to be and how they are now. The following passage is an excerpt from a 1997 US News & World Report article entitled ‘‘A Hole in the Head? A Parents’ Guide to 1044 Mary Kosut Tattoos, Piercings and Worse.’’ It serves as an example of the mainstream media’s acknowledgement of the new tattoo phenomenon, differentiated from the deviant ‘‘bad old days’’ when tattooing was still in the closet, so to speak. Tattoos and piercings are far more mainstream than most parents realize. In a forthcoming study of more than 2,100 adolescents from schools in eight states . . . it was found that 1 in 10 had a tattoo and that over half were interested in getting one. The young ‘‘body-art’’ enthusiasts came from all income levels and ethnic groups. A majority earned A’s & B’s. (Lord 67) There are two elements in this passage that are representative of similar contemporary media accounts of the new and improved mass tattoo culture. The first is the mentioning of tattooing in the context of art. The message is clear: tattoo is acknowledged as having some degree of aesthetic value. The second element is the citing of a shift in the socioeconomic status of the tattoo bearer. Now tattooed kids, both boys and girls, come from ‘‘all income levels and ethnic groups’’ and get good grades. They are no longer the emblems of the economically and socially excluded: punks, gang members, and bad kids from economically ravaged neighborhoods. This perceived cultural evolution functions to sanction the practice of tattooing, allowing the possibility for tattoos to be acceptable to the mainstream, if not into respectability. The new tattooees are not exotic or deviant others—they are everyday people with aesthetic sensibility. Besides stressing shifts in tattoo populations, another significant aspect in the elevation of tattoo’s status can be attributed to articles that declare tattoo to be an art form. A recurring theme is the placement of contemporary tattoo practices within a larger cross-cultural historical context of body modification and body art. For example, a 2001 article on San Francisco tattoo culture proclaims that certain members of the community are ‘‘rediscovering the long-dormant art’’ practiced hundreds of years ago in Polynesia (Hartlaub E4). While a 1998 Boston Globe article, ‘‘Making a Mark on the Culture: Body Piercing, Tattoos, and Scarification Push the Cutting Edge,’’ states that ‘‘since ancient times, the body has been a canvas for adornment’’ (Leonard C1). The skin-as-canvas metaphor presents the body as a legitimate artistic medium that can be placed in a historical frame. If people have been getting tattoos since ancient times and they are An Ironic Fad 1045 considered art in other cultures, then contemporary tattooing can be understood as an extension of these body art practices. The following passage from a 2002 Wall Street Journal article explicitly makes this connection: ‘‘Many of today’s designs reflect the influence of traditional Japanese tattoo artists, who specialized in full-body tattoos that were integrated works of art,’’ says Enid Schildkraut, curator of the anthropology division at New York’s American Museum of Natural History and an expert on tattoo art. ‘‘Many people who have tattoos see it as art, collect it as art and wear it as art.’’ (Greenberger A1) Such discourses, especially those founded on expert testimony as in the passage above, effectively brand tattoo with ethno-historical and aesthetic legitimacy. Other articles connect tattoo directly to the legitimate or high art world by not only equating skin with canvas, but by publicizing the academic training of some tattoo artists. A 2001 New York Times article announces that ‘‘today many practitioners come out of art schools, finding fulfillment in painting on skin rather than on canvas—all with newer designs, brighter inks’’ (James NJ-1). Similarly, another explains that ‘‘the artistry of the business was enhanced’’ with innovative design techniques by contemporary tattoo artists (Hurley 01). Tattoo artists with art school training have clearly influenced the development of new tattoo styles, yet mainstream articles focusing on these changes have also crystallized the connection between tattoo and art in the public’s imagination. The mainstreaming of tattoo, coupled with mass-media discourses either conveying tattoo as art or connecting tattoo to art worlds, are developments that are interrelated. If tattoo is portrayed in the media to be a legitimate aesthetic – cultural form, rather than a distasteful badge that permanently blights the body, then more high-status individuals will invariably be attracted to tattoo. Notwithstanding, as the demographic of tattoo shifts from blue-collar to white-collar, it is not coincidental that both the media and institutional experts would begin to recognize tattoo as having a greater degree of aesthetic – cultural value. Not only art galleries, but also museums dedicated to historical, cultural, and scientific artifacts have responded and contributed to the popularization of tattoo by presenting exhibitions that focus on tattoo specifically, or juxtapose tattoo with other body modification 1046 Mary Kosut practices.8 According to Catherine Ballé, these types of exhibitions are a product of a new museum era, or ‘‘institutional renaissance’’ wherein ‘‘museums have tried hard to attract the public and the public has responded by coming in large numbers’’ (139). Today, privately owned US museums face new challenges, including precarious economic resources and the question of how best to serve a mass public (Ballé 132 – 45; Zolberg 53 – 4). The cultural strategies of American museums have shifted since the 1970s, emphasizing special temporary exhibitions meant to draw a larger and more diverse audience. The Guggenheim Museum’s 1997 Art of the Motorcycle exhibition, and the 1999 – 2000 exhibition, Body Art: Marks of Identity, hosted by the American Museum of Natural History, are prime examples of this contemporary museum strategy. As tattoos are anchored in prestigious cultural institutions their cultural value will continue to rise, further blurring distinctions between high and popular culture. NOTES 1. During the late nineteenth century, some members of the social elite got tattoos as badges of exoticism and distinction. See Sanders and Bradley for a discussion of this short-lived tattoo craze. 2. The Versace advertisement appeared in a variety of magazines and newspapers including the New York Times, Bazaar, Vogue, and W. 3. Tattoo removal technology is available for those who are privileged enough to afford the erasure of a perceived momentary lapse in judgment. Laser treatments can be expensive, and may require numerous painful visits to a doctor, rarely restoring the skin to its original condition. 4. The term ironic fad refers to the practice of tattooing in the broadest sense. Notwithstanding, specific tattoo designs have achieved popularity at different time periods. For example, there was a neo-tribal tattoo fad in the late 1980s and early 1990s in the United States (see DeMello, Bodies 174 – 84). More recently, traditional or ‘‘old school’’ tattoos based on American tattoo imagery from the 1940s and 1950s became increasingly popular among tattoo aficionados in their twenties and thirties. In addition to specific tattoo styles and iconography, where tattoos are placed on the body is reflected in popular trends. The gender, age, and occupation of the bearer can also influence the location of tattoos. 5. Flash refers to drawings of tattoo designs that are commonly found on tattoo studio walls. Flash can be purchased commercially or drawn by individual tattoo artists. 6. Even clients who pick flash off of a tattoo studio wall (rather than a unique design) often reflexively consider where the tattoo will be placed and have acquainted themselves with the types of tattoo images that are commonly available. 7. One respondent told me that after he got his first tattoo, he was quite alarmed upon noticing that the upper layer of skin had started to flake off during the healing process. He said that he thought his tattoo was ‘‘falling off.’’ Although tattoo artists disagree on what products to use to aid healing, most recommend applying an antibiotic cream, followed by a nonperfumebased skin cream for at least a week after initially getting tattooed. Swimming, baths, and An Ironic Fad 1047 sunbathing are discouraged until at least two weeks after the tattoo is healed. After the upper layer of scabby, inked skin sheds, the fresh tattoo is very tender and must be kept clean, dry, and moisturized until the area is fully healed. Thus, the lengthy after-care process is inherently interactive and ongoing. 8. For example, New York City’s South Street Seaport Museum, the American Museum of Natural History, Long Island’s Islip Art Museum, and the Mariner’s Museum in Newport News, VA have hosted tattoo art exhibitions within the last ten years. Works Cited Atkinson, Michael. Tattooed: The Sociogenesis of a Body Art. Toronto: Toronto UP, 2003. Ballé, Catherine. ‘‘Democratization and Institutional Change: A Challenge for Modern Museums.’’ Global Culture: Media, Arts, Policy, and Globalization. Ed. Diana Crane, Nobuko Kawashima, and Ken’ichi Kawasaki. New York: Routledge, 2002. 132 – 45. Bell, Shannon. ‘‘Tattooed: A Participant Observer’s Exploration of Meaning.’’ Journal of American Culture 22 (1999): 53 – 58. Bradley, James. ‘‘Body Commodification?: Class and Tattoos in Victoria Britain.’’ Written on the Body: The Tattoo in European and American History. Ed. Jane Caplan. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2000. 136 – 55. DeMello, Margo. ‘‘Not Just For Bikers Anymore: Popular Representations of American Tattooing.’’ Journal of Popular Culture 29 (1995): 37 – 52. ———. Bodies Of Inscription: A Cultural History of the Modern Tattoo Community. Durham: Duke University, 2000. Greenberger, Walter S. ‘‘Tattoo Taboo: In South Carolina, You Can’t Get One—Kenneth Starr Thinks It Is a ‘Free Speech’ Right for High Court to Decide.’’ Wall Street Journal 4 Sept. 2002: A1. Hall, Stuart, and Tony Jefferson, eds. Resistance Through Rituals: Youth Subcultures in Postwar Britain. London: Routledge, 1993. Hartlaub, Peter. ‘‘Coming of Age Rituals: Wearing the Art of Polynesian Culture.’’ San Fransisco Chronicle 30 Dec. 2001: E4. Hebdige, Dick. Subculture: The Meaning of Style. London: Routledge, 1979. Hurley, Sue. ‘‘Me Too, Step Aside Boys: Women Are Making Mark with Tattoos.’’ St. Louis Post Dispatch 4 Sept. 2002: 01. Irwin, Katherine. ‘‘Legitimating the First Tattoo: Moral Passage through Informal Interaction.’’ Symbolic Interaction 12.1 12 (2001): 49 – 73. James, George. ‘‘From Back Alleys to Beauty Queens.’’ New York Times 29 July 2001: NJ-1. 1048 Mary Kosut Kosut, Mary. ‘‘Tattoo Narratives: The Intersection of the Body, SelfIdentity and Society.’’ Visual Sociology 15 (2000): 79 – 100. Leonard, Mary. ‘‘Making a Mark on the Culture: Body Piercing, Tattoos, and Scarification Push the Cutting Edge.’’ Boston Globe 15 Feb. 1998: C1. Levine, Donald, ed. Georg Simmel: On Individuality and Social Forms. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1971. Lord, Mary. ‘‘A Hole in the Head? A Parent’s Guide to Tattoos, Piercings and Worse.’’ US News and World Report Sept. 1997: 67 – 69. MacDonald, Dwight. ‘‘A Theory of Mass Culture.’’ Mass Culture. Ed. B. Rosenberg and D. M White. Glencoe, IL: Free Press, 1957. 59 – 79. McCabe, Michael. New York City Tattoo: The Oral History of an Urban Art. Honolulu, HI: Hardy Marks, 1997. Pitts, Victoria. ‘‘Reclaiming the Female Body: Embodied Identity Work, Resistance and the Grotesque.’’ Body and Society 4.3 (1998): 67 – 84. Ritz, David. Tattoo Nation: Portraits of Celebrity Body Art. New York: Bulfinch Press and Rolling Stone Press, 2002. Sanders, Clinton. Customizing the Body: The Art and Culture of Tattooing. Philadelphia: Temple UP, 1989. Seiler, Cotton. ‘‘The Commodification of Rebellion: Rock Culture and Consumer Capitalism.’’ New Forms of Consumption: Consumers, Culture and Commodification. Ed. Mark Gottdiener. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2000. 203 – 26. Sheilds, David. ‘‘36 Tattoos.’’ Village Voice 16 – 22 Oct. 2002: 34 – 36. Sullivan, Nikki. Tattooed Bodies: Subjectivity, Textuality, Ethics and Pleasure. Westport, CT: Praeger, 2001. Sweetman, Paul. ‘‘Anchoring the (Postmodern) Self? Body Modification, Fashion and Identity.’’ Body and Society 5 (1999): 51 – 76. Vail, D. Angus. ‘‘Tattoos are Like Potato Chips . . . You Can’t Have Just One: The Process of Becoming and Being a Collector.’’ Deviant Behavior 20 (1999): 253 – 73. Zolberg, Vera, and Joni Cherbo, eds. Outsider Art: Contesting Boundaries in Contemporary Culture. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1997. Mary Kosut is an Assistant Professor of Sociology and Media, Society, and the Arts at Purchase College, State University of New York. Her areas of interest and research include visual art, the body, popular and alternative cultures, and ethnographic fieldwork. She has published work on tattoo art, body modification, and academic culture in journals such as Deviant Behavior, Visual Sociology, and Cultural Studies—Critical Methodologies.