Customizing the Body (PDF file) - Print My Tattoo

216 Notes to Chapter 5
Chapter 5
1. The importance of the social status of the creator in determining
whether a product is defined as art or as something else (and consequently
inferior) is well illustrated by the ongoing resistance of the art world to
certifying material objects typically produced by women as being “real”
art. Most commonly, women’s creations are either ignored by the male
dominated art world (see Heller, 1987) or relegated to the second-class
category of “craft” (see Banks, 1987; Needleman, 1979; Crane, 1987: 60;
Becker, 1982: 247–258; Maines, 1985).
2. The class structure of the social system in which the art world exists
has been the dominant structural feature of interest in most sociological
discussions of art forms and artistic style. See, for example, Hauser, 1982:
94–307; Fischer, 1970; Lomax, 1970; Pellegrini, 1966.
3. The major way in which cultural items created, enjoyed, and consumed
by disvalued social groups come to affect the materials and activities
of upper-class taste publics is through “bottom-up” cultural diffusion
or, to use a less neutral term, cultural imperialism. Much of the innovation
that takes place in high fashion and modern dance, for example,
comes from the sanitizing appropriation of stylistic elements initiated in
“street culture” (see Hirschman, 1981b) and by members of impoverished
social groups (see Gans, 1971).
4. Due largely to its physical intrusiveness and historical connections
to marginal groups, tattooing is prohibited or the focus of extensive regulation
by local governmental agencies in most states. Despite official disapproval
and restraint, the tattoo service is readily available throughout
the United States. Best’s (1981) discussion of the effectiveness of social
control directed at the media points to the reasons why regulation is relatively
ineffective in decreasing the availability of tattooing. He maintains
that legal restraint is most effective when the cost of production and distribution
is high, the number of artifacts and available distribution channels
is low, the production industry displays a heavy reliance on advertising,
and the audience/consumer group is heterogeneous and includes
children. These conditions do not characterize contemporary commercial
tattooing.
5. The mass media are the major source of public information about
the physical and normative reality of American society. When tattooing is
presented in the media it is associated almost exclusively with unconventional,
dishonorable, dangerous, and otherwise deviant social types. (See,
for example, the mentally disordered character played by Bruce Dern in
Bob Brooks’ Tattoo [1981], the heavily tattooed “hero” in Clive Barker’s
Hellraiser [1987] and the extensive publicity given to Richard Speck’s
“born to raise hell” tattoo.) The disreputable symbolic baggage carried by
tattooing is well illustrated in the copy used in a current mailorder catalogue
which is intended to entice people to purchase a set of “stick-on”
tattoos.