Tattooed feminine bodies: Regulation, conformity, and resistance Submitted for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy At the University of Northampton 2017 Charlotte Jade Dann © Charlotte Jade Dann, 2017, Doctor of Philosophy. This thesis is copyright material and no quotation from it may be published without proper acknowledgement. 1 Table of Contents Acknowledgements Page 5 Abstract Page 6 Chapter 1 - Introduction Page 8 1.1 – Why research tattooed feminine bodies? Page 9 1.2 – The Chapters Page 10 Chapter 2 - Literature Review Page 15 2.1 – Femininities Page 15 2.2 – Embodiment Page 24 2.3 – Social Discourses Page 34 2.4 – Theoretical perspectives Page 41 2.5 – Conclusions and research questions Page 47 Chapter 3 – Methodology Page 49 3.1 – Research approach Page 49 3.2 – Participants and recruitment Page 50 3.3 – Interviews and schedule Page 53 3.4 – Media analysis Page 56 3.5 – Recording and transcription Page 58 3.6 – Ethical considerations Page 59 3.7 – Analytic framework Page 60 3.8 – Reflexivity Page 62 3.9 – Conclusions Page 67 Chapter 4 – Regulation of tattooed women’s bodies in the media: A media analysis Page 69 4.1 – Tattoos as transformative Page 70 4.2 – Moral and cautionary tattoo tales Page 78 4.3 – Tattoos as a trend Page 86 4.4 – Conclusions Page 91 Chapter 5 – Regulation and social norms Page 93 5.1 – ‘Right’ and ‘wrong’ choices Page 93 5.2 – Generation norms produced about tattoos Page 98 5.3 – Regulation of tattooed mothers Page 103 2 5.4 – Constructions of professionalism Page 111 5.5 – Conclusions Page 117 Chapter 6 – Tattooed feminine bodies Page 119 6.1 – Ageing Bodies Page 119 6.2 – Tattoos as a marker of stability Page 125 6.3 – Visibility of tattoos Page 130 6.4 – Tattoos as art on the body Page 136 6.5 – Conclusions Page 142 Chapter 7 – Variability in feminine positionings Page 144 7.1 – Negotiating femininities Page 144 7.2 – Tattoo imagery Page 152 7.3 – Classed femininities Page 157 7.4 – Perceptions of normative femininities and space for tattoos Page 163 7.5 – Conclusions Page 168 Chapter 8 – Inscribed meaning on the skin Page 170 8.1 – Family and community belonging: traditions and memories written on the body Page 171 8.2 – The production of bonding through tattoos Page 177 8.3 – Communicating personal narratives with tattoos Page 182 8.4 – The embodied practice of pain Page 187 8.5 – Conclusions Page 192 Chapter 9 - Reflexivity Page 194 9.1 – How has my previous history led to my interest in this topic? Page 194 9.2 – What are my personal value systems? Page 208 9.3 – Where is the power held in relation to my research and where am I in the power hierarchy? Page 208 Chapter 10 - Conclusions Page 210 10.1 – The importance of feminist research Page 210 10.2 – Tattooed bodies as gendered and classed Page 212 10.3 – Regulation and resistance Page 215 3 References Page 220 Appendices Appendix A – Ethical documentation for the project Page 249 Appendix B – Examples of initial coding for analysis Page 258 Appendix C – Example mind map of early analysis Page 260 Appendix D – Table of media articles for analysis Page 261 Table 1 – Interview participants Page 51 Figure 1 – My first tattoo Page 199 Figure 2 – My ‘meaningful’ tattoo following from working in America Page 200 Figure 3 – Being tattooed at the London Tattoo Convention Page 204 4 Acknowledgements I would like to take the opportunity to thank my supervisory team; Jane Callaghan, Evangelia Prokopiou, and Lisa Fellin, whose support saw me through a challenging four years of my PhD, as well as my undergraduate and master’s degrees at Northampton. I feel very lucky to have had a strong team that have provided priceless knowledge and guidance in research and working in academia. I cannot thank enough the women who took part in the research, allowing for me to be able to talk about a topic I am so passionate about with other like-minded people. They were generous with both their time and their words, and imprinted on me a lot more understanding about what it means to be a tattooed woman. I also have to acknowledge the support of the Psychology of Women Section – attending their annual conference each year of my thesis provided a welcoming and constructive space to discuss feminist research has made a huge difference in how I see myself as an academic, as a researcher, and as a woman. Finally, I want to thank my family and friends who have been wholly supportive along the way and never doubted my ability to succeed. Specific thanks to Matt for the unfathomable cups of tea made and chocolate retrieved in getting me through the process. I would not have got this far without your love and support. 5 Abstract Normative constructions of femininity in the UK are constructed around white, middle-class, and thin ideals for women (Francombe- Webb & Silk, 2016), serving to ‘other’ different productions of femininity. Tattooed women have historically been associated with working-class bodies. Class-based constructions shape the way that the tattooed body is read, with particular implications for how tattoos are seen as ‘tasteful’ and ‘authentic’ (DeMello, 2000). The intersection of tattooed bodies with factors such as class and gender serve as points of tension to unpack in regard to how women negotiate their feminine positions – tacky versus tasteful, common versus other, visible versus invisible. Using an intersectionally informed qualitative approach, this thesis explores the production of discourses both within the media, and from interviews with tattooed women. In the media analysis, 35 articles were selected following a systematic search. Tattooed feminine bodies are represented in varying ways: as transformative objects, as cautionary tales, and also as a fashion trend or artistic object, accessible and appealing to middle-class women. The discourses (re)produced within the media articles are congruent with previous research, linking tattoos with issues of mental health and wellbeing (Roberts, 2012) and working-class constructions of tattooed women as unattractive (Swami & Furnham, 2007). I interviewed fourteen tattooed women in total, using purposive sampling to speak to women from a variety of backgrounds, ages, ethnicities and employment positions. Discourse analysis (Parker, 1992) was drawn upon to explore how the women constituted themselves in talk, and what the function of these constructions were. Within the interviews, women simultaneously narrate tattoos as resistant objects that enable them to transgress ideals of the feminine body, and regulate the tattooed body through constructions of ‘right’ and wrong’ ways to be tattooed. Women’s accounts also 6 articulated how tattoos are embodied, and also drew on a sense of tattoos as inscribing meaning on the skin. In their accounts, their talk about the tattooed feminine body intersected with other accounts of the feminine, as ‘mother’, as relational being, as ‘professional’. The analysis demonstrates the importance of exploring the multiplicities in women’s positionings. I conclude this thesis by considering the methodological and theoretical implications of the research. As a reflexive researcher, I have acknowledged how I as a tattooed woman, academic, researcher, and feminist have co-constructed the discourses produced and presented within the research. I argue that it is important to draw on reflexive accounts in feminist research, showing how the self has an impact on research (Wilkinson, 1988), allowing for further exploration of these positions. I also argue that this research contributes to how we understand gaze, regulation, and resistance. Tattooed bodies may subvert normative gendered expectations, but they also conform to and reinforce them in others, and are still positioned under the male gaze. The othering of tattooed women is done by reinforcing one’s own position as a tattooed woman – regulating the body through the production of factors such as authenticity and taste. The thesis navigates the multiplicity of positionings for tattooed women, providing a point for future research to unpack. 7 Chapter 1 – Introduction The decision I made to conduct this research was informed by my own experiences as a tattooed woman, and recognising that my own positioning as a tattooed woman is contextually constituted and located in relation to my gender, age, class, and a multitude of other positionings. Whilst I have seen changing attitudes towards tattooed women in recent years (Meads & Nurse, 2013), I am aware that there are pervasive negative constructions of tattooed women that are perpetuated through societal discourses and practices (Swami & Furnham, 2007). My engagement with the tattooed feminine body is personal, political and academic, and in this thesis, I do not only consider how other women make sense of tattoos; I consider how I as researcher, academic, and tattooed woman, am intertwined with the work that I produce. In 2005, I got my first tattoo as a present for my 18th birthday. It was something I had planned for months, and had designed myself, and it felt good being a bit rebellious by having it done. I was told frequently by friends, family and also strangers, that I was not the ‘type’ of woman who gets tattoos. The notion of a ‘type’ was produced as something negative, bound in societal expectations around the ‘typical’ life trajectory: career, heterosexual Western weddings, mothering, and associated ideals of ‘good’ femininity. Initially, I did not quite make full sense of these constructions, and how they functioned to regulate women’s bodies: the tattoos that followed the first one remained on hidden locations of my body, only visible when I chose to make them so. It was not until 2011 when I got my first bigger, visible tattoo on my forearm that I noticed a significant shift in how people spoke to me and what they expected of me.