Morbid Anatomy presents at Observatory Tonight (!!!), July 20th. Hope to see you there!
Morbid Ink: Field Notes on the Human Memorial Tattoo
An Illustrated lecture with Dr. John Troyer, Deputy Director, Centre for Death and Society, University of Bath
Date: Tuesday July 20th
Time: 8:00
Admission: $5
Presented by Morbid AnatomyIn 1891, Samuel F. O’Reilly of New York, NY patented the first “…electromotor tattooing-machine,” a modern and innovative device that permanently inserted ink into the human skin. O’Reilly’s invention revolutionized tattooing and forever altered the underlying concept behind a human tattoo, i.e., the writing of history on the body. Tattooing of the body most certainly predates the O’Reilly machine (by several centuries) but one kind of human experience remains constant in this history: the memorial tattoo.
Memorial tattooing is, as Marita Sturken discusses the memorialization of the dead, a technology of memory. Yet the tattoo is more than just a representation of the dead. It is a historiographical practice in which the living person seeks to make death intelligible by permanently altering his or her own body. In this way, memorial tattooing not only establishes a new language of intelligibility between the living and the dead, it produces a historical text carried on the historian’s body. A memorial tattoo is an image but it is also (and most importantly) a narrative.
Human tattoos have been described over the centuries as speaking scars and/or the true writing of savages; cut from the body and then collected by Victorian era gentlemen. These intricately inked pieces of skin have been pressed between glass and then hidden away in museum collections, waiting to be re-discovered by the morbidly curious. The history of tattooing is the story of Homo sapiens’ self-invention and unavoidable ends.
Tattoo artists have a popular saying within their profession: Love lasts forever but a tattoo lasts six months longer.
And so too, I will add, does death
Dr. John Troyer is the Death and Dying Practices Associate and RCUK Fellow at the Centre for Death and Society at the University of Bath. He received his doctorate from the University of Minnesota in Comparative Studies in Discourse and Society in May 2006. From 2007-2008 he was a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Comparative Studies at The Ohio State University teaching the cultural studies of science and technology. Within the field of Death Studies, he analyzes the global history of science and technology and its effects on the dead body. He is a co-founder of the Death Reference Desk website and his first book, Technologies of the Human Corpse, will appear in spring 2011.
You can find out more about this presentation here. You can get directions to Observatory--which is next door to the Morbid Anatomy Library (more on that here)--by clicking here. You can find out more about Observatory here, join our mailing list by clicking here, and join us on Facebook by clicking here.
- Chocolate Artistry [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 4th, 2010]
- La Cabeza Circuitoide [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 5th, 2010]
- Stuntkid: Anatomically Correct [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 5th, 2010]
- "The Secret Museum" Exhibition Opening, Observatory, This Saturday, April 10, 7-10 PM [Last Updated On: April 6th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 6th, 2010]
- "The Secret Museum" Exhibition Opening, Observatory, This Saturday, April 10, 7-10 PM [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 6th, 2010]
- Flat Surgery [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 7th, 2010]
- Job Opportunities at the Medical Museion, University of Copenhagen [Last Updated On: April 9th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 9th, 2010]
- "The Secret Museum" Exhibition Opening, Observatory, TONIGHT! April 10, 7-10 PM [Last Updated On: April 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 10th, 2010]
- Animal Body Worlds at the Neunkirchen Zoo, Saarland, Germany [Last Updated On: April 11th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 11th, 2010]
- Congress for Curious People: Lectures Begin Tomorrow Night at the Coney Island Museum! [Last Updated On: April 12th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 12th, 2010]
- Job Opportunities at the Medical Museion, University of Copenhagen [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 12th, 2010]
- Animal Body Worlds at the Neunkirchen Zoo, Saarland, Germany [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 12th, 2010]
- "The Secret Museum" Exhibition Opening, Observatory, TONIGHT! April 10, 7-10 PM [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 12th, 2010]
- Anatomic Fashion Friday: Skeleton Bodysuit [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 12th, 2010]
- Diabetes Ads [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 12th, 2010]
- Anatomia del corpo humano [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 13th, 2010]
- "The Brading Collection of Taxidermy, Waxworks, Costume and Similar Items," Duke's Auction House, Dorset, April 13th (Today!) [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 14th, 2010]
- Anatomy Pillow [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 14th, 2010]
- A Brief History of Automata, An Illustrated Lecture and Demonstration by Mike Zohn, Obscura Antiques and Oddities, TONIGHT! Coney Island Museum [Last Updated On: April 14th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 14th, 2010]
- "The Brading Collection of Taxidermy, Waxworks, Costume and Similar Items," Duke's Auction House, Dorset, April 13th (Today!) [Last Updated On: April 15th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 15th, 2010]
- A Brief History of Automata, An Illustrated Lecture and Demonstration by Mike Zohn, Obscura Antiques and Oddities, TONIGHT! Coney Island Museum [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 15th, 2010]
- Hip Pockets [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 15th, 2010]
- "A History of Taxidermy: Art, Science and Bad Taste," An Illustrated Presentation By Dr. Pat Morris, Congress for Curious People, Coney Island Museum [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 16th, 2010]
- “Wild Anatomy” by Rachel “Thirsty Fly” Caldwell [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 16th, 2010]
- Charles Wilson Peale and the Birth of the American Museum, Coney Island Museum, Tonight!!! [Last Updated On: April 16th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 16th, 2010]
- "The Congress for Curious People," Epic 2-Day Symposium Begins Tomorrow!!! [Last Updated On: April 16th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 16th, 2010]
- "A History of Taxidermy: Art, Science and Bad Taste," An Illustrated Presentation By Dr. Pat Morris, Congress for Curious People, Coney Island Museum [Last Updated On: April 17th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 17th, 2010]
- Charles Wilson Peale and the Birth of the American Museum, Coney Island Museum, Tonight!!! [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 17th, 2010]
- "The Congress for Curious People," Epic 2-Day Symposium Begins Tomorrow!!! [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 17th, 2010]
- Anatomic Fashion Friday: Lady Grey Jewelry [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 17th, 2010]
- "Stuffed Animals and Pickled Heads" Book and Lecture by Stephen Asma, Thursday April 22, Observatory [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 20th, 2010]
- "The Silken Web: The Erotic World of Paris, 1920-1946," Mel Gordon Lecture at Observatory, Tomorrow April 20th [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 20th, 2010]
- Marylin Monroe Exposed [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 20th, 2010]
- The Dance of Death, 1919, Attributed to Josef Fenneker [Last Updated On: April 20th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 20th, 2010]
- "Stuffed Animals and Pickled Heads" Book and Lecture by Stephen Asma, Thursday April 22, Observatory [Last Updated On: April 21st, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 21st, 2010]
- "The Silken Web: The Erotic World of Paris, 1920-1946," Mel Gordon Lecture at Observatory, Tomorrow April 20th [Last Updated On: April 21st, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 21st, 2010]
- The Dance of Death, 1919, Attributed to Josef Fenneker [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 21st, 2010]
- Military Docs Pluck Live Shell From Soldier’s Head [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 21st, 2010]
- "The Rogue Taxidermy Kunstkammer," The Minnesota Association of Rogue Taxidermists, La Luz de Jesus, Los Angeles [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 22nd, 2010]
- "Museums, Monsters and the Moral Imagination" Lecture by Stephen Asma, Tonight!, Observatory [Last Updated On: April 22nd, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 22nd, 2010]
- "The Rogue Taxidermy Kunstkammer," The Minnesota Association of Rogue Taxidermists, La Luz de Jesus, Los Angeles [Last Updated On: April 23rd, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 23rd, 2010]
- "Museums, Monsters and the Moral Imagination" Lecture by Stephen Asma, Tonight!, Observatory [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 23rd, 2010]
- Feminal Artery [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 23rd, 2010]
- Anatomic Fashion Friday: Penis Trousers [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 24th, 2010]
- The First Full Facial Transplant [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 26th, 2010]
- "Anatomical Art: Dissection to Illustration," Exhibition Curated by Marie Dauenheimer, Arlington, Virginia [Last Updated On: April 26th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 26th, 2010]
- "Anatomical Art: Dissection to Illustration," Exhibition Curated by Marie Dauenheimer, Arlington, Virginia [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 27th, 2010]
- John C. Miller [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 27th, 2010]
- "Three Unique Medical Museums in Northern Italy," Lecture by Marie Dauenheimer, Observatory, Saturday May 1 [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 28th, 2010]
- This Is Spinal Tape [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 28th, 2010]
- "Excellent Old-School Science Models," Life Magazine Photo Gallery [Last Updated On: April 28th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 28th, 2010]
- "Three Unique Medical Museums in Northern Italy," Lecture by Marie Dauenheimer, Observatory, Saturday May 1 [Last Updated On: April 29th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 29th, 2010]
- "Excellent Old-School Science Models," Life Magazine Photo Gallery [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 29th, 2010]
- Ventricle Vase [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 29th, 2010]
- "Imaging / Imagining the Skeleton," Symposium, Tomorrow, Friday, April 30, 1:00-4pm, CUNY Graduate Center [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 30th, 2010]
- Synthetic Being [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: April 30th, 2010]
- Tomorrow Night at Observatory! "Three Unique Medical Museums in Northern Italy," Lecture by Marie Dauenheimer [Last Updated On: April 30th, 2010] [Originally Added On: April 30th, 2010]
- "Imaging / Imagining the Skeleton," Symposium, Tomorrow, Friday, April 30, 1:00-4pm, CUNY Graduate Center [Last Updated On: May 1st, 2010] [Originally Added On: May 1st, 2010]
- Tomorrow Night at Observatory! "Three Unique Medical Museums in Northern Italy," Lecture by Marie Dauenheimer [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 1st, 2010]
- UIC’s Biomedical Visualization Program on CBS [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 1st, 2010]
- Kim Joon [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 1st, 2010]
- Head of Discovery and Engagement, Wellcome Library, Employment Opportunity [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2010]
- Talking While Driving [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2010]
- "Experimenting with Death: An Introduction to Terror Management Theory," Lecture, Observatory, Thursday May 6 [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 3rd, 2010]
- Skin Drawings [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 4th, 2010]
- Kabinett des Grotesken ("Cabinet of the Grotesque"), Berliner Medizinhistorisches Museum der Charité, Spiegel Online [Last Updated On: May 4th, 2010] [Originally Added On: May 4th, 2010]
- Head of Discovery and Engagement, Wellcome Library, Employment Opportunity [Last Updated On: May 5th, 2010] [Originally Added On: May 5th, 2010]
- "Experimenting with Death: An Introduction to Terror Management Theory," Lecture, Observatory, Thursday May 6 [Last Updated On: May 5th, 2010] [Originally Added On: May 5th, 2010]
- Kabinett des Grotesken ("Cabinet of the Grotesque"), Berliner Medizinhistorisches Museum der Charité, Spiegel Online [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 5th, 2010]
- WAD Magazine [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 5th, 2010]
- "The Saddest Object in the World," An Illustrated Meditation, Observatory, Friday, May 7th [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2010]
- "An Atlas of Topographical Anatomy after Plane Sections of Frozen Bodies," Christian Wilhelm Braune, 1877 [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2010]
- The Taxidermy of Mr. Walter Potter and his Museum of Curiosities, Melissa Milgrom [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2010]
- Industrial Strength Lungs [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2010]
- The Taxidermy of Mr. Walter Potter and his Museum of Curiosities, Melissa Milgrom [Last Updated On: May 6th, 2010] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2010]
- Tonight!!! "Experimenting with Death: An Introduction to Terror Management Theory," Lecture, Observatory [Last Updated On: May 6th, 2010] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2010]
- Original Fritz Kahn Posters and Key Booklet, Sotheby's Vintage Posters Auction, May 13 [Last Updated On: May 6th, 2010] [Originally Added On: May 6th, 2010]
- "The Saddest Object in the World," An Illustrated Meditation, Observatory, Friday, May 7th [Last Updated On: May 7th, 2010] [Originally Added On: May 7th, 2010]
- "An Atlas of Topographical Anatomy after Plane Sections of Frozen Bodies," Christian Wilhelm Braune, 1877 [Last Updated On: May 7th, 2010] [Originally Added On: May 7th, 2010]
- Tonight!!! "Experimenting with Death: An Introduction to Terror Management Theory," Lecture, Observatory [Last Updated On: August 17th, 2024] [Originally Added On: May 7th, 2010]