Critical Thinking Choice

This piece of writing titled Body Art happens to be my favorite piece but it is also my strongest piece as far as demonstrating critical thinking skills. I had a hard time picking a topic for my pop culture essay to analyze the challenge that new traditions have on old ones. I started thinking about reality TV shows and the change that they have brought to television viewing. This did not last long because as I said in my Reflection letter I do not watch reality shows at all even though I realize the huge impact that have had. Then I went to the topic of really skinny models and I think my group was thinking “come on and stick with one already”, they seemed to sense my non committal to the topic. So I was searching for a topic and I was talking to my husband about it and telling him what a struggle I was having and he said that’s easy write about tattoos! Duh! My husband and I had just gotten matching tattoos (not the one pictured) for our ten year anniversary and so this was a topic that I actually had life experience to contribute to my paper.

I feel that I did a good job analyzing how people with tattoos are being accepted by employers if they have one or two tattoos but that there is an exception to this acceptance when the person is covered in tattoos. I pointed out how “Conventionally having a tattoo could have resulted in limiting a tattooed persons employment options because of the stereotype that was attached to them but society’s new acceptance has opened the door for these people to not be judged on their tattoos alone. The exception to this new acceptance is if a person has multiple tattoos and especially if they are on the face. This appears to have the traditional effect of these people being judged on the stereotype rather than their individual qualities”.

I believe that I also managed to demonstrate synthesis by bringing together the tradition of tattoos and the tradition of commemorating a loved ones death. A current trend in the pop culture of body art is to tattoo the portrait of a loved one who has passed away on to the body as a way to create a permanent memorial. I also synthesized this idea by incorporating the essay by Jenn Shreve titled “A Fitting Memorial: The Commemorative T-shirt” which is about the new trend of putting a picture of the deceased on a t-shirt to wear at the memorial instead of the traditional attire. To demonstrate this idea to the reader I wrote in my essay “Now tattooists can tattoo an actual life like portrait, of the person being honored, with great detail. There is a similar artistic expression that is described in the essay by Jenn Shreve who talks about the new trend of wearing a commemorative t-shirt to a funeral instead of the traditional suit. Jenn relays the significance of the t-shirt to her audience by saying “Obviously a memorial t-shirt isn’t meant to replace the stone monument on a plot of green grass, the engraved urn, or scenic bench. It simply adds a new dimension to the traditional memorial”. (Shreve) This same principle applies to tattooing as it is the current trend to tattoo the face of a loved one that has passed away onto the body as a way to commemorate the death”.


The process of writing an analytical paper was daunting in the beginning but by the end I felt strongly that I had managed to fulfill the assignment. These two examples above of analysis and synthesis are part of the reason that my paper appears to be credible. My personal experience that I describe in the essay seems to have added a depth and authenticity to its content. I enjoyed writing this paper and I hope you enjoy reading it. Lucky for you I think reading it will be a lot less painful than actually getting one, a tattoo that is!