Tattoos: A story waiting to be told

Photo Cred: Augusto Serna

Photo Cred: Augusto Serna

Gone are the days that tattoos were reserved for gangsters, pirates, criminals and other socially unsavoury characters. Now they can be seen on business men and women, housewives, teenagers (troubled or not), fathers, manual labourers and basically anyone in any industry. They are no longer a taboo thing: they are generally accepted by society, especially the younger generation.

A small tattoo is visible on the left forearm

Photo Credit: Austin Mills (there is a small tattoo visible on the forearm)

Tattoos may be gaining popularity – according to The Harris Poll one in five Americans had a tattoo as of 2012 and that number is growing – but tattoos are nothing new. The earliest tattoo dates back to the Neolithic era, also known as the New Stone Age, which was around 12,000 years ago. Evidence of tattoos were found on seven mummies of Egyptian women that could be dated back to around 2,000 B.C., according to The Smithsonian. The women with these tattoos were believed to be dancers or prostitutes, one of the one was a royal concubine. Another theory is that the tattoos were some kind of representation of pregnancy. Historians are not sure of who would have done these tattoos but it is thought older women would have tattooed the younger women.

Today, tattoos can symbolize any number of things. They could be a religious signal or perhaps a representation of a person’s culture. Samoan tribal tattoos have become popular, even to people who are not from New Zealand. Actor Dwayne Johnson has a rather large Samoan tribal tattoo running from his elbow, up his arm and over his chest. The tattoo incorporates tribal patterns as well as his family and the spirits that guide him. Rhianna went so far as to have her tribal tattoo more traditionally applied: the tattoo artist chiselled the tattoo onto her hand, the traditional way of doing these tattoos.

Photo Cred: Mez Love

Photo Credit: Mez Love

Photo Cred: Mez Love

Photo Credit: Mez Love

Cooper London Photography

Photo Cred: CooperLondon

Many people choose to have their loved ones commemorated in a tattoo, whether it be a portrait, the person’s name or perhaps, as Angelina Jolie did, the coordinates of their birth places.

Probably the most important thing about any tattoo is that it is unique to the person getting it and that it represents them. However, representing yourself in a tattoo can sometimes go too far: Jackass actor Steve-O has a portrait of himself covering most of his back. Artistically speaking the tattoo is incredibly well done but Steve-O himself refers too many of his tattoos as “dumb tattoos.” Many people around the world would probably agree with this assessment. Some people’s commemorative tattoos seem to make no sense at all to the outside world. South African singer Ninja from Die Antwoord has the number 16 tattooed under his eyes, which at first seems like a random number but it is, in fact, a commemorative tattoo for his daughter, whose name is Sixteen.

Employers and society appear to have become more accepting of all kinds of tattoos. There will always be those drunken tattoos that the person regrets getting, or perhaps the tattoo of an ex you can no longer stand. But no matter how ridiculous a tattoo seems, as long as it means something to the person it is on, then it’s serving a purpose. It is a permanent fixture that, perhaps, future generations will study in attempt to understand our society.

Shannen Johnson-Barker

South African stuck in Canada trying to find something interesting about it all. Potential journalist, if all goes well that is. Enjoy exploratory adventures through journalism and searching for unusual stories that are potentially interesting.

3 Comments

  • Avatar
    Reply October 12, 2014

    Lesley Salazar Ayquipa

    I like your piece! Tattoos are definitely more accepted these days and more people are getting them, this looks like a new trend. I agree with you that for some people tattoos symbolize something important for them.

  • Taylor Lima
    Reply October 13, 2014

    Taylor Lima

    Great piece! I worked at a pizzeria for a long time, and the owner was not one to turn someone away from a job just because they had tattoos; he himself has quite a few that would be visible to customers when he was working. He always said that it was high time that people stop stereotyping everyone with a tattoo as a slacker, and I wholeheartedly agree with him (especially because I have 3 myself).

  • Kyanna Claybrook
    Reply October 23, 2014

    Kyanna Claybrook

    Well done article, and I liked all the pictures showing examples of what you were talking about. My dad got a tattoo of a dragon on his back and being the hipster he is only got it becuase it was something that not a lot of people did back then. In his opinion, getting a tatto now is no longer unique becuase everyone seems to be doing it, but I disagree. If you get a tatto just becuase you see it as a fad than you are getting it for the wrong reason. I think tattoos become unique when they have a meaning behind them specific to the person getting it.

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