Inked nostalgia: displaying identity through tattoos as Hawaii local practice

Abstract

Almost a century after the end of the period of Japanese immigration to Hawaii plantations, the Japanese language is no longer the main medium of communication among local Japanese in Hawaii. Today, use of the Japanese language and associated traditional images are often used symbolically rather than literally to convey their meanings, and this is becoming more prevalent among locals through the medium of tattooing. Furthermore, tattooed texts and visual images now are imbued with additional local-specific indexicals that distance them from native Japanese from Japan. These tattoos are not just a fashion statement as the tattooees are committed to their own identity as represented by them. These inked identities have a value in the local community that draws on Japaneseness, but a form of Japaneseness does not necessarily share native Japanese values. Based on the data used for this study, it is clear that this method of declaring ‘true’ Japaneseness is decried as unthinkable and unacceptable to native Japanese. These different perceptions of Japanese text and images in tattoos suggest that because of their mobility, the immigrant Japanese group went through a radical transition and created new cultural values in a new homeland.

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