Modern primitives or urban primitives are people in developed nations who engage in body modification

Body modification

Body modification is the deliberate altering of the human body for any non-medical reason, such as aesthetics, sexual enhancement, a rite of passage, religious reasons, to display group membership or affiliation, to create body art, shock value, or self expression...

 rituals and practices while making reference or homage to the rite of passage

Rite of passage

A rite of passage is a ritual event that marks a person's progress from one status to another. It is a universal phenomenon which can show anthropologists what social hierarchies, values and beliefs are important in specific cultures....

 practices in "primitive cultures" These practices may include body piercing

Body piercing

Body piercing, a form of body modification, is the practice of puncturing or cutting a part of the human body, creating an opening in which jewelry may be worn. The word piercing can refer to the act or practice of body piercing, or to an opening in the body created by this act or practice...

, tattooing, play piercing

Play piercing

Play piercing, needle play, or recreational acupuncture is body piercing done for the purpose of enjoying the experience rather than producing a permanent body decoration. Needles, sharpened bones, or other tools used in play piercing are removed from the body when the episode is complete, allowing...

, flesh hook suspension

Suspension (body modification)

A suspension is the act of suspending a human body from hooks that have been put through body piercings. These piercings are temporary and are performed just prior to the actual suspension.- Method :...

, corset training, scarification

Scarification

Scarifying involves scratching, etching, burning, or superficially cutting designs, pictures, or words into the skin as a permanent body modification.In the process of body scarification, scars are formed by cutting or branding the skin...

, branding, and cutting

Self-harm

Self-harm or deliberate self-harm includes self-injury and self-poisoning and is defined as the intentional, direct injuring of body tissue most often done without suicidal intentions. These terms are used in the more recent literature in an attempt to reach a more neutral terminology...

. The motivation for engaging in these varied practices may be personal growth, rite of passage

Rite of passage

A rite of passage is a ritual event that marks a person's progress from one status to another. It is a universal phenomenon which can show anthropologists what social hierarchies, values and beliefs are important in specific cultures....

, or spiritual

Spirituality

Spirituality can refer to an ultimate or an alleged immaterial reality; an inner path enabling a person to discover the essence of his/her being; or the “deepest values and meanings by which people live.” Spiritual practices, including meditation, prayer and contemplation, are intended to develop...

 or sexual curiosity.

Roland Loomis, also known as Fakir Musafar

Fakir Musafar

Fakir Musafar is considered the father of the modern primitive movement. He has experimented on his own body with body modification techniques such as body piercing, tightlacing, scarification, tattooing, and suspension, and has documented, shared and taught others as part of his life's work...

, is considered the father of the modern primitive movement. The 1989 RE/Search

RE/Search

RE/Search Publications is an American magazine and book publisher, based in San Francisco, founded and edited by Andrea Juno and V. Vale in 1980. It was the successor to Vale's earlier punk rock fanzine Search & Destroy , and was started with $100 from Allen Ginsberg and Lawrence Ferlinghetti...

 book Modern Primitives

Modern Primitives (book)

Modern Primitives, written by V. Vale and Andrea Juno, is a RE/Search publications book about body modification, published in 1989. The book consists of a collection of twenty two interviews and two essays with individuals and key figures involved the field of body modification in the late 1980s...

is largely responsible for the promotion of the concept of modern primitivism.