Tattoos Accepted?

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EVANnEXISTEpas
Posts: 1
Joined: Wed Oct 21, 2009 2:20 am

Tattoos Accepted?

Post by EVANnEXISTEpas » Wed Oct 21, 2009 10:22 pm

Hello all,

I'm strongly considering switching majors from history to linguistics in order to teach ESL, preferably overseas.
However, I'm heavily tattooed. I'm getting my hands lased off currently, but my entire neck is pretty well covered also, and I don't know the practicality of getting it off... outside of wearing a turtleneck, what's the general industry consensus on tattoos on teachers? And for those that have knowledge of other cultures (excluding Asia, which I know is too conservative for me,) would I find more, less, or roughly equal acceptance anywhere else? Anywhere in Europe?
I was told by an ESL student today, also, that my tattoos actually made her feel more comfortable. Her logic was that being MIddle Eastern and living in the US makes for her receiving undue/unfair prejudice based on nothing but superficial things like her name and appearances, and that I, being as tattooed as I am, must have gone/go through similar trials, thus would be more understanding and less apt to jump to preconveived conclusion about others. Which is true. But it made me feel really good about myself and hopefully is indicative of future foreign learners. If I could make the newly arrived feel more at ease so we could get to the task at hand i.e. learning English... something to look into!
Thank you!

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