Before technological advances people have struggled with being able to identify others. For example shown in the reading “A History of Fingerprinting and identification” in the late 1800’s European authorities tried different methods such as keeping a register of descriptive marks to identify repeat offenders or “Recidivist”. Authorities would use distinctive marks on criminals such as, a scar on the left arm or, a a tattoo on the chest of a criminal. This way if the offender came back to jail after being let go it would be easy to identify them as a repeat offender. Although this sounds like a good idea the labor became way to high for little results and very little was being done about repeat offenders.
Believe it or not even in every day life we use these sort of techniques to identify one another. An example of this is from the movie American History X which as a scene (provided below) following Derek, a white supremacist, into prison. On his way out to the yard he states “Im just going to throw up a flag and hope a friend sees it” which in this case was his white supremacy tattoos. In an attempt to find a “friend” as he puts it he proceeds to take off his shirt exposing his tattoos and who he is. This does draw the attention of other Neo-Nazi members. Although it does not directly tell you who he is it shows what he represents and others can identify him as either a friend or an enemy. Just like lambroso used tattoos to identify people so did derek in this situation.
*NOTE: Only watch from 1:36-2:30
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_-KH03ozR0&bpctr=1342910620&skipcontrinter=1
