Into the Wild: A Reflection on Cosplay in Public Discourse: Notes on an Unfolding Semantic Shift (Part One)
/“Our words are not without meaning, they are an action, a resistance.”
“The fight against bad English is not frivolous…”
Cosplay is big news today. And I’m not just talking about within the realms of fandom and fan studies; cosplay has hit the mainstream hard over the last few decades. A socio-cultural evolution seeing its meaning change in ways unexpected and not yet quite understood. Once describing a subcultural, niche fan practice, cosplay is fast becoming a metonym for all kinds of dressing up practices. Forget the subtleties of masking and costuming, masquerade, mimicry, fancy dress, dressing up, or just plain old dressing, it’s all cosplay now.[1] As a natural aspect of evolving phenomena, semantic shifts are hardly surprising— that’s not the story here. Like seasoned seamsters, fans and scholars are always adjusting the meaning of cosplay, altering its pattern and form, letting it out a bit here, a timely tuck or hem there, and always embellishing our understanding of this art of making otherwise. Less important then is the idea that cosplay’s meaning is stretchable, it’s the origin, nature, and agents of this particular public amplification that I want to observe and consider, and its potential impact upon what’s rather magically called the “cosphere.”
Pinpointing when I first became aware of journalists using cosplay as shorthand for dressing up in Western mainstream news and entertainment media reportage is tricky. I inappreciably felt the approaching storm before realizing it, like catching the sweet whiff of ozone on the summer air. A quick search of newspapers suggests it couldn’t have been before 2021 because that’s when “cosplay” starts showing up in news headlines. In the UK, the trend gathered pace during the 2022 Conservative Party leadership election, in which both candidates — Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak — were accused of cosplaying a variety of sources, from professions and trades to economic classes and past political figures.[2] Well-heeled Sunak, for example, was described as “cosplaying” a soldier and “playing” at being a plebeian, rather poorly, it has to be said, and Truss too, who was also mocked for her “Thatcherite cosplay”.[3] Moreover, as a “walking embodiment of [the] union flag,” Truss — frequently dressed in red and blue color blocks — was also thought likely to be cosplaying the Union Jack, the UK’s national flag, alongside dangerous concepts like nationalism and patriotism. (Following that line of thought, former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher herself arguably cosplayed as soldiers and Russians.)
Images of Truss (bottom row) “cosplaying” as Thatcher (top row). Source: @LouisHenwood
This semantic shift did not go unnoticed. Large parts of the notoriously irreverent British public gleefully seized upon the idea of cosplaying politicians— a garden-fresh stick to beat them with. Prior to this groundswell of usage, cosplay-as-dress-up was most often targeted at former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson — infamous for dress up and play acting— and his “Cosplay Cabinet”: “A quick glance through their PR shots you will find top politicians dressed in camouflage, branded jumpers, hardhats, aprons, lab coats, police jackets, goggles and fishmonger hats.”
There’s nothing new in politicians dressing up to attract voters or to build their brand, of course. Appearing as or like another popular or public figure can help make the strange familiar, efficiently signaling political stances and continuities and so forth; a helpful tactic for “unknown quantities” wishing to amass public appeal quickly (and economically), as we’ll see later. And much like fan cosplayers, they draw upon a mix of sources, real life and fictional and specific and general.
JFK set a trend for Air Force bomber jackets, a vogue followed by every US president since, usefully tying into martial and hero mythologies.[4] Vladimir Putin reinforces his alpha male image by dressing up as all kinds of “action men,” from soldiers and bikers to hunters, the bare-chested variety. Buffoons and clowns continue to inspire Johnson and Donald Trump from their pantomime coiffures to their outsize clothing and grins.[5] And when official campaign photos of the usually sharp-suited French President Emmanuel Macron showed him unshaven and wearing a black special forces hoodie, he was roundly “accused” of cosplaying Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Election campaigns, however, see even the most sartorially challenged politicians dress up as something, anything to attract voters; in the US, it’s often cowboys, in the UK farmers, in Taiwan, it’s Squid Game players, and in Peru, to secure the “otaku” vote, it’s anime characters.
Dressing up like fictional secret agents — think James Bond, all dark custom suits and bespoke watches — is de rigueur amongst male politicians of all stripes, however. (Tellingly, Putin’s personal vehicle registration plate is 007.) Like the imported trees in Belfast’s iconic “Palm House,” our idea of what powerful people look like — resolutely male and wearing business attire — is planted, deep-rooted, and out of place. Thus, women politicians too, sadly, often dress up like — or, today, cosplay as? — male politicians and tycoons, or spies. As Mary Beard writes, “we have no template for what a powerful woman looks like, except that she looks rather like a man.” Social progress, of course, brings the possibility of altering that template.
J’accuse!
But it’s not just politicians, journalists, or dissenters who are driving this semantic shift. Public discourse is awash with all kinds of people describing all kinds of other people as cosplayers, often in accusatory tones.[6] Members of American far-right, neo-fascist, male organizations are frequently, and mockingly, characterized as cosplaying Nazis or soldiers, real and fictional (e.g., “Call of Duty,” Peacemaker, or Punisher). Antifa fighters, those black-clad activists known as the “black bloc,” are likewise described as cosplaying soldiers or ninjas or even — to tactically muddy the waters — MAGA devotees, that’s to say charged with cosplaying MAGA insurrectionists at the January 6th Capitol Riot. Frequently too, MAGA adherents denigrate Antifa activists as “cosplay activists,” those whose activism is performative rather than substantive.
Keeping with the rich MAGA theme, CPAC 2022 not only played brazenly with fascist and Nazi symbolism and iconography but dabbled with performance art in the form of a tableau vivant.[7] While characterized on social media as cosplay, the “living picture” performance was closer to a cosplay skit, a short theatrical piece or performance. Hatched by pro-Trump influencer Brandon Straka, the skit’s surreality makes it worthy of description: a teary white male (Straka) wearing a fresh orange jump suit — and incongruously a red MAGA cap and conference badge — sits barefoot in a prop jail cell.[8] A consolatory Marjorie Taylor Greene kneels at his feet, scarlet-clad, dollish ‘n’ doltish, and happy to play Mary Magdalene to his sideshow Jesus. Outside the “cell” a tepid hellfire “preacher” leads an offbeat congregation in prayer. (If you feel up to it, you can check it out here.) After the act, onlookers could either silently contemplate the weepy prisoner — surely parodying commemorative traditions of silent moments — or don a headset and listen to testimonies from those arrested on January 6th, getting an earful and an eyeful at the same time— a watery encounter promoting reflection, one hopes.
With everything noted so far, you’d be forgiven for thinking that we’ve reached the limit of actions describable as cosplay.[9] Not so. In the public imagination, such is the stretchiness of “cosplay” that countries may be described as cosplaying other countries, from other times: during a United Nations Security Council meeting, Sergiy Kyslytsya (Ukrainian ambassador to the UN) asked, “Why has the Russian Federation decided to cosplay the Nazi Third Reich by attacking the peaceful neighboring state and plunging the region into war?”
Note that, apropos behavior, nothing is changing here; people are doing what they’ve always done, and countries; the only thing changing is how journalists and editors and everyday people are now choosing to describe those doings: what was once dress up, mimicry, pantomime, and so forth is now cosplay. A specialized media fan term is being publicly co-opted, in real-time; its meaning (potentially) altered as frequent misuse becomes standard. And, as we’ll get into later, adopting “fanspeak” allows lay users to tap into a wellspring of subordinate meanings, often nefariously; that’s to say, politicians readable as media fans, or “worse” — as far as flattening gender stereotypes go — as media “fanboys” or “fangirls.” The action of dressing up in the public sphere is itself undergoing something of a semantic costume change. And we must, as George Orwell advises, be ever watchful of language change — buzzwords, euphemisms, replacements, etc. — enacted by the state and its agents and adopted within public discourse, as we’ll also get into later.
Yet perhaps there’s good reason for the curious uptake of cosplay in news media and everyday parlance, and it’s not just a bad habit demonstrating muddy thinking. After all, the behaviors I’ve been cataloging do share much with fan cosplay— as far as a meaning or definition of media fan cosplay can be pinned down, that is. But do they fall within what Theresa Winge usefully describes as the “cosplay continuum”?
Let’s take a closer look.
Countries aside, people are using modes of dress to play with their identity; in many cases, there’s a citation of specific sources (real and fictional); some parties make their “costumes” while others shop for them; costumes can be outlandish or “everyday,” the latter form mirroring developing trends within fan domains for less costumey modes of cosplay, such as Disneybounding or “stealth” or “closet” cosplay. As in fan cosplay, certain performances have more depth than others with some “players” perfecting idiolects, facial expressions, gestures, mannerisms, and so on. But it can go deeper. News media, for example, described Truss as cosplaying Thatcher sartorially and ideologically; as with Thatcher, Truss cultivated a reputation for hard-nosed politics and an unbending leadership style.[10] During the 2022 leadership contest, the British public watched Truss (try to) forge herself as an “Iron Lady”; in keeping with technological advances, her robotic and despotic performance proved, however, rather more “Evil Robot Maria” from Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927).
Does it seem fair then that people describe these behaviors as cosplay? Yes, perhaps. But for all the points of connection, something blocks me from affirming these kinds of happenings as cosplay. I sense a disconnect; deeper realities lie beneath surfaces. Encountering another mainstream headline or news story ballyhooing “cosplay” is like coming upon a cultural shadowland, offering a grimmer, soulless view or version of cosplay. Something is missing from these mainstream usages and practices, something vital, some vital things. To regain the missing things is to make sense of the disconnect.
Self-definition is one of those missing things. And relatedly, intention. Intention to cosplay, that is. (There are plenty of other intentions behind these usages and dress-up performances— courting voters, for example.) Like vegans, cosplayers announce themselves. That’s to say, they happily self-identify as cosplayers; they want you to know they’re cosplaying or are part of cosplay culture. Even those performing “stealth” or “closet” cosplay acknowledge their practice in some form, public or personal; inquiries upon it are not met with surprise, denial, or silence. Even cosplayer politicians — in the traditional fannish sense — like Taiwanese legislator Lai Pin-Yu proudly affirm themselves as part of the cosplay family. But the people involved in the opening examples are described as cosplaying; they do not recognize or identify themselves as cosplaying, nor indeed as dressing up; others label them so. Even today, politicians, say, may be unaware that “cosplay” is a thing, never mind a thing that they might do— such are the bubbles we inhabit.
Thus, while some politicians might be readable as cosplaying, they might not see it that way; they’re not trying to “be” or to “be recognized” as someone else; it’s accidental, coincidental, detrimental, if discovered. Stated otherwise, those “cosplaying,” or channeling the look or ideas of other national leaders, for example, would surely deny it. In their world, imitation is far from a sincere form of flattery (unless you’re the one being imitated, that is). Rather, it suggests fakery, unoriginality, and followership, as well as play-acting; when what politicians want, no, need is to be seen as the real deal, as trailblazers, as serious leaders, as themselves.
Is awareness a requisite of cosplay? To what extent must we know we’re doing it to be doing it? Must cosplay, like war or bankruptcy, be declared to be “real”? A curious question given cosplay’s deep bond to the imaginary, which brings me to my next missing thing— imagination.
Cosplay is an art of making things otherwise— the self, the text (in its broadest sense), the world. As Theresa Winge memorably describes it, cosplay is all about “costuming the imagination.”[11] The word we have somehow settled upon — for the time being, things can always change in cosplay culture — to describe this diverse range of behaviors tells us everything we need to know; more than just “dressing up as,” cosplay combines costume and (role)play and is deeply bound to the imagination and invention and pleasure and desire. Even when the cosplayer means only to replicate their source text, it’s still an act of imagination, often lovefuelled.[12] A worldmaking act illustrating a bondedness to the origin text and a wish to share and celebrate that bond with everyone, and to give and take pleasure in that sharing, in connecting with the source and with cosplay communities, real world and digital.
All this good stuff — creativity, pleasure, transformation, belonging, worldmaking — materializes from everyday encounters with the imagination. It’s hard to imagine cosplay without imaginings, and gloomy. Imagine: a wren without a song; a spring morning without its chorus— “a thousand blended notes”; a heart without cause to soar— “the freshness of the morning/ the dew drop on the flower.” The objects — bird, dawn, heart — remain in this imagining but lacking now the things that make them manifestly them.[13] And that’s what I feel when I see what’s being reported as cosplay in mainstream news and social media. It looks like people (possibly) dressing up as other kinds of people, all surface and no heart. And I find that it doesn’t really look like cosplay at all.
Where’s the intention, the creativity, the love, the community, the play?
A trail of questions returning me to my terminus a quo: Why are a great many people choosing to replace perfectly good terms — dress up, mimicry, costuming, copycat, and so forth — with cosplay? Beyond observing this surface change, what are we to make of it? What deeper realities lie beneath this semantic shift?
Artwork: “Once Emerged from the Gray” of Night by Paul Klee (1918).
[1] A semantic shift synonymous with the wider mainstreaming, or massification, of media fandom.
[2] Labour Party leader Kier Starmer described Liz Truss as indulging in “Thatcherite cosplay,” while he himself was accused of engaging in “Blairite cosplay.” Note: “Thatcherite” refers to previous UK (Conservative) Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher (1979-1990) and “Blairite” to previous UK (Labour) Prime Minister, Tony Blair (1997-2007.
[3] Notorious and odious right-wing British politician Jacob Rees-Mogg is routinely identified in news and social media as cosplaying a “toff” (a member of the British “upper-class”), particularly “Lord Snooty,” a character from the iconic British comic, Beano. For a fascinating broader discussion of class, mimicry, and British politicians, see “‘The Beano's’ Lord Snooty” (Part 4 of 4) by Dave Miller. CEOs and celebrities also tap into this kind of class cosplay, billionaire “tech bros” wearing priceless jeans and hoody combinations etc.
[4] JFK refers to former US President, John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1961-1963).
[5] Johnson is regularly derided for his awful “Churchill cosplay” too, referring to former UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill (1940-1945, 1951-1955.
[6] The selection of examples included here are drawn from social media searches and offer only an illustrative sample of how “cosplay” is being used within public spaces and discussions.
[7] The Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC for short.
[8] Straka was himself convicted on misdemeanor charges after the Jan 6th attack.
[9] I’ve been sticking to political realms but similar expansions in cosplay usage may be observed in other spheres, such as business, technology, climate industries, creative industries, and so forth.
[10] Thatcher too, famously, lowered the timbre of her voice and adopted “mannish” mannerisms to match dominant ideas of what powerful people look like, as discussed earlier.
[11] See, “Costuming the Imagination: Origins of Anime and Manga Cosplay” by Theresa Winge (Mechademia, 2006).
[12] Or “coser” as is popular within China’s cosplaying communities; a term gaining international traction, you see how language shifts and bends. Interestingly, note that this contraction drops the “play”— a discussion for another day.
[13] Fragment from “Lines Written in Early Spring” by William Wordsworth. Lines from “My Heart Soars” by Chief Dan George.
Biography
Based in the north of Ireland, Ellen Kirkpatrick is an activist-writer with a PhD in Cultural Studies. In her work, Ellen writes mostly about activism, pop culture, fan cultures, and the transformative power of storytelling. She has published work in a range of academic journals and media outlets. Recovering the Radical Promise of Superheroes: Un/Making Worlds, her open access book on the radical imagination and superhero culture, can be found here. Ellen can be found writing at The Break .
