Journal 5

I believe the three most important concepts about everyday writing that we have discussed in class so far would be the purpose, place and scene, and non-institutionalized, and I believe they all align with tattoos, therefor, I would consider tattoos a piece of everyday writing. 

There are a wide variety of reasons why people chose to get tattoos, whether it be to mark an event that occurred in their life, or to convey a particular message to everybody that sees the tattoo, or to express their feelings and emotions through a piece of art. For whatever reason a person got a tattoo, it has a specific purpose. Purpose is crucial to providing context to a situation, and without having a reason to construct a piece of everyday writing, it would not have created it to begin with. This is clearly true of tattoos. 

The place and scene where someone got a tattoo on their body tells a great deal of it's purpose. The location of a tattoo on a persons body is a method of expressing personal feelings and conveying a message in itself, just as the placement of a photo on a scrapbook page is. There's a reason why a person chooses to get a tattoo of a particular thing on a specific place on their body, and that contributes to the way it will be seen by others, and the reaction it causes. The fact that the place and scene of a tattoo is so important contributes to the characteristics that consider them to be everyday writing. 

Since a piece of everyday writing cannot be institutionalized, justifying that tattoos are not is important in order to consider them a piece of everyday writing. While the process of making a tattoo had to be taught, the art created by the tattoo artist is not. The design a person picks for their tattoo is most likely not something they learned about at school or a university, or at work. It's more likely something that is everyday that is important enough to them that they want it to be on their body permanently for the rest of their lives. While the process of making the tattoo may not be everyday, the feelings and messages it's expressing are.