Tattoo Traditions of Asia


Book Description

For millennia, tattoos have documented the history of humanity one painful mark at a time. They form a visual language on the skin, expressing an individual’s desires and fears as well as cultural values, family ties, and spiritual beliefs on the surfaces of the body. The Indigenous peoples of Asia have created some of the world’s oldest and most distinctive tattoos, but their many contributions to body art and practice have been largely overlooked. Tattoo Traditions of Asia is the first single volume dedicated to the anthropological study of an ancient cultural practice and artform that spans many countries and societies, ancestral lands, and contemporary communities across the continent and its islands. This richly illustrated survey combines the author's twenty years of fieldwork, interviewing hundreds of Indigenous tattoo bearers and contemporary tattoo practitioners, with painstaking research conducted in obscure archives throughout the region and elsewhere to break new ground on one of the least-understood mediums of Indigenous Asian expressive culture—a vital tradition to be celebrated, an inspirational story told in skin and ink.




The Geography of Thought


Book Description

When Richard Nisbett showed an animated underwater scene to his American students, they zeroed in on a big fish swimming among smaller fish. Japanese subjects, on the other hand, made observations about the background environment...and the different "seeings" are a clue to profound underlying cognitive differences between Westerners and East Asians. As Professor Nisbett shows in The Geography of Thought people actually think - and even see - the world differently, because of differing ecologies, social structures, philosophies, and educational systems that date back to ancient Greece and China, and that have survived into the modern world. As a result, East Asian thought is "holistic" - drawn to the perceptual field as a whole, and to relations among objects and events within that field. By comparison to Western modes of reasoning, East Asian thought relies far less on categories, or on formal logic; it is fundamentally dialectic, seeking a "middle way" between opposing thoughts. By contrast, Westerners focus on salient objects or people, use attributes to assign them to categories, and apply rules of formal logic to understand their behaviour.




Ancient Ink


Book Description

The human desire to adorn the body is universal and timeless. While specific forms of body decoration and the motivations for them vary by region, culture, and era, all human societies have engaged in practices designed to augment and enhance people’s natural appearance. Tattooing, the process of inserting pigment into the skin to create permanent designs and patterns, is one of the most widespread forms of body art and was practiced by ancient cultures throughout the world, with tattoos appearing on human mummies by 3200 BCE. Ancient Ink, the first book dedicated to the archaeological study of tattooing, presents new, globe-spanning research examining tattooed human remains, tattoo tools, and ancient art. Connecting ancient body art traditions to modern culture through Indigenous communities and the work of contemporary tattoo artists, the volume’s contributors reveal the antiquity, durability, and significance of body decoration, illuminating how different societies have used their skin to construct their identities.




Japanese Tattoos


Book Description

Thinking of getting a Japanese-style tattoo? Want to avoid a permanent mistake? Japanese Tattoos is an insider's look at the world of Japanese irezumi (tattoos). Japanese Tattoos explains the imagery featured in Japanese tattoos so that readers can avoid getting ink they don't understand or, worse, that they'll regret. This photo-heavy book will also trace the history of Japanese tattooing, putting the iconography and kanji symbols in their proper context so readers will be better informed as to what they mean and have a deeper understanding of irezumi. Tattoos featured will range from traditional tebori (hand-poked) and kanji tattoos to anime-inspired and modern works--as well as everything in between. For the first time, Japanese tattooing will be put together in a visually attractive, informative, and authoritative way. Along with the 350+ photos of tattoos, Japanese Tattoos will also feature interviews with Japanese tattoo artists on a variety of topics. What's more, there will be interviews with clients, who are typically overlooked in similar books, allowing them to discuss what their Japanese tattoos mean to them. Those who read this informative tattoo guide will be more knowledgeable about Japanese tattoos should they want to get inked or if they are simply interested in Japanese art and culture.




Filipino Tattoos


Book Description

Tattooing is a very old and spiritually respected art form that has existed in many different cultures around the world. After many centuries of not being practiced in Europe, tattooing was re-introduced to the Western world through the inhabitants of the Pacific Ocean. Beginnning in the 16th century, European explorers came across many people who practiced tattooing as an integral part of their cultures. This is the first serious study of Filipino tattoos, and it considers early accounts from explorers and Spanish-speaking writers. The text presents Filipino cultural practices connected with ancestral and spiritual aspects of tattoo markings, and how they relate to the process and tools used to make the marks. In the Philippine Islands, tatoos were applied to men and women for many different reasons. It became a form of clothing. Certain designs recognized manhood and personal accomplishments as well as attractiveness, fertility, and continuity of the family or village. Facial tattoos occurred on the bravest warriors with names that denoted particular honor. Through the fascinating text and over 200 images, including color photographs and design drawings, the deep meanings and importance of these markings becomes apparent.




Tattoo Traditions of Native North America


Book Description

"For thousands of years astonishingly rich and diverse forms of tattooing have been produced by the Indigenous peoples of North America. Long neglected by anthropologists and art historians, tattooing was a time-honoured traditional practice that expressed the patterns of tribal social organization and religion, while also channelling worlds inhabited by deities, spirits, and the ancestors. This book explores the many facets of indelible Indigenous body marking across every cultural region of North America. As the first book on the subject, it breaks new ground on one of the least-known mediums of Amerindian expressive culture that nearly disappeared from view in the twentieth century, until it was reborn in recent decades"--Page 4 of cover.




Tattooed Bodies


Book Description

The essays collected in Tattooed Bodies draw on a range of theoretical paradigms and empirical knowledge to investigate tattoos, tattooing, and our complex relations with marks on skin. Engaging with diverse disciplinary perspectives in art history, continental philosophy, media studies, psychoanalysis, critical theory, literary studies, biopolitics, and cultural anthropology, the volume reflects the sheer diversity of meanings attributed to tattoos throughout history and across cultures. Essays explore conceptualizations of tattoos and tattooing in Derrida, Deleuze and Guattari, Lacan, Agamben, and Jean-Luc Nancy, while utilizing theoretical perspectives to interpret tattoos in literary works by Melville, Beckett, Kafka, Genet, and Jeff VanderMeer, among others. Tattooed Bodies prompts readers to explore a few significant questions: Are tattoos unique phenomena or an art medium in need of special theoretical exploration? If so, what conceptual paradigms and theories might best shape our understanding of tattoos and their complex ubiquity in world cultures and histories?




Tatau


Book Description

"Jean Tekura Mason's poetry reflects her life as a person living in two worlds - Polynesian and European. Some of her poems are reflective. Others are glib (and deliberately so). There is humour and there is passion - of love and hate, pagan faiths and Christian beliefs, ancestors and dancers, customs and politics, migrants and immigrants, and Pacific flora and fauna - all have stimulated Ms Mason to put pen to paper. At times incisive and descriptive, and at others deeply moging, this book is a collection of poems which is both retrospective perceptive"--Back cover




Japanese Tattooing Now


Book Description

Japanese men have been marked by tattoo artists for the past 300 years. Todays urbane Japanese youth continue the tradition, proudly creating and wearing this ever changing art form. Over 530 breathtaking color photos display a vast range of Japanese tattoos, from traditional full-body forms repleat with classical images steeped in symbolism, including Horimono, to modern One-Point style, heavily influenced by the cultures of the West.\nThe fascinating text provides a glimpse of Japans youth culture and recounts, through personal interviews, stories of Japanese masters of the tattoo art, including Senseis Horihide, Horiyoshi III, Horitoshi I, Horiyasu, and Horikoi. Readers will see some of the most intricate tattoo art in the world, while traveling through time from the 19th century Edo Floating World to the busy streets of modern Tokyo.




Tattooed Skin and Health


Book Description

With about 10–20% of the adult population in Europe being tattooed, there is a strong demand for publications discussing the various issues related to tattooed skin and health. Until now, only a few scientific studies on tattooing have been published. This book discusses different aspects of the various medical risks associated with tattoos, such as allergic reactions from red tattoos, papulo-nodular reactions from black tattoos as well as technical and psycho-social complications, in addition to bacterial and viral infections. Further sections are dedicated to the composition of tattoo inks, and a case is made for the urgent introduction of national and international regulations. Distinguished authors, all specialists in their particular fields, have contributed to this publication which provides a comprehensive view of the health implications associated with tattooing. The book covers a broad range of topics that will be of interest to clinicians and nursing staff, toxicologists and regulators as well as laser surgeons who often face the challenge of having to remove tattoos, professional tattooists and producers of tattoo ink.




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