title: [Tatoos, piercing: body art? Body damage? Debasement of the body or return to a primitive way of life?].
abstract: Tatoos and piercing, though they might appear as something like a trend, if not a craze, remain for a majority minority and even fringe practices. For the adolescent, questing for his identity (no more a child, not yet an adult), the tegmental sign is a way of engraving in the flesh dramatic events of his existence. The body mark is a search for independence, a symbolic attainment of self-reliance, a way of severing the umbilical cord and of asserting oneself. In face of a life no longer under control, the body is an object at hand, on which self-will is almost unbridled... These body modifications testify to change.
authors.affiliation: Cabinet médical, dermatologie, 23, rue de Saint-Pétersbourg, 75008 Paris, France. catherine.grognard@wanadoo.fr
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Grognard
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001154:Art; D046288:Body Piercing / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D016728:Self-Injurious Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D013653:Tattooing / Q000523:psychology*