Research

 

"Radical body modification has experienced expanded expression, appropriation and visibility within the last several decades. Most scholarly interest has cast such practices in the context of pathology, class-bound deviance or subcultural ideological expression. Decisions to obtain tattoos and radical body piercings (locations other than ears), as modest forms of body modifications, are examined among a sample of college students at a midwestern, regional university. Subjects with and without these body modifications are emperically compared. Overall, evidence suggests suggests that tattoos and body piercings are being deconstructed as expressions of pathology, deviance and subcultural expression and are becoming increasingly part of a consumer inventory for selection. Hence, decisions to acquire tattoos and radical piercings are no longer bound by social class, expressions of deviance and pathology, or themes of ideology, but are purchased merely as commodities in a consumer culture." - (isus.edu)