An interesting point about these narratives, DeMello adds, is that they are structured as dialectical arguments, in which the speaker assumes a listener who either objects to the practice of tattooing or does not understand it the speaker's role, then, is to illuminate the practice and defend it. She identifies various 'tattoo narratives' that distance the practice from its histori- cally negative associations, and finds that such narratives offer original and complex justifications for the tattoo. Tattooing since the 1960s has developed new meanings, argues DeMello.

Through these influences, writes DeMello, 'middle-class competitiveness and individuality along with an elevated sense of aesthetics have been grafted onto a working-class tradition,' making tattoos 'fit for middle-class consumption.' The causes and effects of this significant cultural shift is the focus of DeMello's investigation in the book.ĭeMello describes the historical context in which the new tattoo community exists and identifies two major transitions in the history of tattooing in North America: the influence of sophisticated new Japanese designs, starting in the 1960s, which offered more individualistic and exotic imagery than those associated with the older tattoo tradition and the growth of tattoo conventions and magazines, a decade later, through which people interested in tattooing could form a community and even compete for increasingly creative images. As she shows, tattoos in earlier eras were associated with the working classes, but since the 1980s have become widely popular among the middle class. Writing as both an academic and a member of the tattoo community, DeMello explores the history of tattooing and recent changes in the tattoo communities in North America. Her book Bodies of Inscription: A Cultural History of the Modern Tattoo Community attracted significant critical attention. Margo DeMello is a cultural anthropologist and animal rights advocate. Williams) Why Animals Matter: The Case for Animal Protection, Prometheus Books (Amherst, NY), 2007.Įncyclopedia of Body Adornment, Greenwood Press (Westport, CT), 2007. Low-Carb Vegetarian, Book Publishing (Summertown, TN), 2004. Davis) Stories Rabbits Tell: A Natural and Cultural History of a Misunderstood Creature, Lantern Books ( New York, NY), 2003.

WRITINGS:īodies of Inscription: A Cultural History of the Modern Tattoo Community, Duke University Press (Durham, NC), 2000. House Rabbit Society, president and executive director Central New Mexico Community College, faculty member.

Education: University of California, Davis, Ph.D.

Stories Rabbits Tell by Susan E. Davis