Modern Primitives

Publisher:  Re/Search Publications, San Francisco, CA 94133 USA, USA
Year Published:  1989
Pages:  212pp   Price:  $18   ISBN:  ISBN 0-940642-14-X
Resource Type:  Serial Publication (Periodical)
Cx Number:  CX4260

An anthropological inquiry into a contemporary social enigma: the increasingly popular revival of ancient human decoration practices such as tattooing and piercing.

Abstract: 
Modern Primitives describes itself as "an anthropological inquiry into a contemporary social enigma: the increasingly popular revival of ancient human decoration practices" such as tattooing and piercing. The volume integrates text and pictorial material into an arresting and thought-provoking whole. Included are twenty-two interviews with artists and practitioners, as well as a section of quotations and a bibliography. While the photographs and drawings -- some of them not for the squeamish -- are the immediately visually striking thing about the book, the most challenging and philsophically intriguing parts are the interviews which explore why people are driven to define their identities by reshaping their physicial appearance in ways that often defy social conventions.

Subject Headings

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