In the face of the pandemic, we have been forced to adopt strategies in order to balance our doctoral work at the same time as caring for our families. As the digital turn has pervaded both social and academic milieus, we consider the potentials and shortcomings of remote interactions and approaches and how they have impacted our work and personal lives. We focus on the challenges of balancing paid work and the unpaid work of care, as well as considering potential changes to the concept of care in terms of building a caring culture.
European society has been described more than once as poor in shared rites of passage. The manipulation of skin seems to be an increasingly popular solution to fulfil perceived cultural gaps. Can contemporary tattoos be interpreted as tools of commemorating life events, especially in the occasion of births and deaths? This article analyses meanings associated with tattoos collected during two ethnographies in central Italy. Based on qualitative interviews and participant observation, the first fieldwork focuses on death-commemorative tattoos, while a 2020 (n)ethnography investigates birth-celebrative tattoos. Data confirm that the body is the mirror of the self and the skin works as the plastic stage where the embodiment of mourning and other emotions meets the social world. Tattoos are attempts of personalized spiritualities, where births and deaths become key-moments of existence that are elected pillars of the self. However, they are not (only) a private affair. This paper addresses the intersubjective valence of tattoos and their communicative purpose. In parallel with references related to both the self and the others, ethnographical data support an interpretation of tattoos as modern self-making strategies, applied to re-ordinate the past and to project a suitable self for the future.
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