Tattooed Bodies, Urban Spaces: An Ethnographic Exploration of Tattoo Practices in Oran (Algeria) and Cologne (Germany)

In this article, we examine the social representations and symbolic meanings of tattooing in two distinct urban environments: Oran, Algeria, and Cologne, Germany. Our research combines longterm fieldwork conducted in Oran (20242025) for a Master's dissertation in urban anthropology, with an exploratory comparative fieldwork carried out in Cologne in December 2025 within the framework of the DiaMiGo Project at the University of Cologne, under the supervision of Professor Martin Zillinger. Mobilising the theoretical frameworks of symbolic interactionism, Louis Wirth's conception of urbanism as a way of life, and Erving Goffman's dramaturgical approach, we analyse how tattooing (as a corporeal practice) articulates identity, belonging, resistance, and stigma across two radically different urban contexts. While in Oran tattooing operates at the tense boundary between centre and margin, simultaneously signalling personal freedom and social transgression, in Cologne it functions as a normalised artistic practice embedded in the urban fabric. The comparison reveals how the city itself, its anonymity, density, and symbolic power, shapes the meanings that bodies inscribe on themselves.