Exploring Cosplay. Excerpts from my undergraduate thesis.

Probably the most common question I am asked after a person learns that I have spent time in Japan is, "So what's up with cosplay, anwayays?" (or something to javascript:void(0)that extent.) Indeed, cosplay peaked my interests many years back so much so that it drove me to write my senior thesis in Anthropology about it. So here it is folks: some excerpts taken from my undergraduate thesis about cosplay. Although I have expanded my research since my senior year, I would like to note that this thesis is copy written and therefore, PLEASE do not attempt to use any part of these excerpts OR photos without my permission. If you would like to cite it please contact me at my email. ladylarajones@ladylarajonesadventures.com

What I would really like to know is what other cosplayers think about some of the conclusions I have made. Do you think there is something more to cosplay? Or is it just another fun weekend out? Read through and then respond to the questions at the end. Also: Please note that I was not able to upload all of my photos due to slow internet, I am working on adding them over the next couple of days. Please be patient as they will not all be immediately available.

 Thank you,
Lady Jones (aka J.L.G.)

A young male cosplayer (shown center) plays the part of a member of the Visual K Band "The Gazette" (Copyright JLG 2006)

This thesis is the written product of an ethnographic project that will give the reader everything they need to know in order to obtain a basic understanding of the cosplay youth culture phenomenon from Tokyo, Japan. When possible, the author has used photography to further illustrate concepts and images that are difficult to describe with narrative alone.

            Why I became an observer of Otaku

I attended my first Anime convention in the spring of 2005. Anime Boston was still a small convention at that time, growing and gaining popularity alongside the new waves of anime coming over and being distributed by large corporations for the first time in such volume. Anime, for me, had been a kind of media that stood out and grabbed my attention amidst a sea of cartoons that attempted to either sell merchandise or comply with a series of guaranteed money-making criteria. Since I wasn’t Japanese, Anime did not (outright) seek to grab me as a consumer, and I appreciated it as a new media. I had first watched anime on Cartoon Network when I was in middle school in the late nineties and was drawn in by its unique art and animation styles, along with plots, themes, and ideas that would never have come out of an American production company. As a casual viewer I started picking up titles here and there, looking for things that were well-translated (a more difficult pursuit before major corporations in the U.S. starting distributing anime) and appealed to my then-teenage mind. As time went on I started reading about Japanese culture and history and grew interested in the more nuanced understanding of anime. I soon found myself analyzing films and series for content, theme, and inspirations from Japanese society, historic contexts, religious myths, and international influences. Around this time I began studying anthropology at Franklin Pierce College and found myself at Anime Boston with a group of students who told me conventions were the “thing” to attend if one was a true fan of Anime and Manga.

When I first walked in the door I saw a group of students in their late teens dressed as characters right out of an anime I had seen on television only a few days prior. I opened my eyes in disbelief and wondered how they had acquired such costumes in America. “Did those people go to Japan?” I asked my friend. She laughed and replied, “No, those are just cosplayers. They just make costumes for conventions like these.” Immediately I was curious about this idea. It reminded me of science fiction conventions and Renaissance Fairs. After taking numerous pictures and asking people casually about cosplay at the convention, I returned to my dorm room and browsed the internet for information about cosplay. What astounded me was there were not many authoritative sources to go to for information about this brightly colored movement. All I could find were young people talking about cosplay in forums and on blogs, all referring to Harajuku, Japan, and the mysterious cosplay communities. Little did I know that my initial curiosity about cosplay would take me to Tokyo for a summer, and spark a series of hypotheses that I would eventually develop into this senior thesis. 

Thesis Statement

In this thesis I hope to give the reader a more encompassing picture of cosplayers and their lives, one that does not yet appear in books or on the internet, in such a way that unravels the mysteries and social contexts that cosplay surrounds. I will describe cosplay and then go on to explain this phenomenon. My hypothesis is that cosplay, like many costuming cultures before it, is a hobby that is pursued for many reasons – including escape, artistic expression, and fun!

Does Japanese cosplay emerge in response to a stratified society that places immense pressure on its youth to succeed? Does it manifest itself in relation to anti-corporate movements? What part does identity formation play in this? Why would people identify with such a vibrant, artistic expression if not to escape and at the same time make a social statement? I will answer all of these questions in this thesis.

Introduction to Theory

Social construction theory (also known as social constructivism) states that everything we know is based on the mental construction of our reality, which emerges from specific historical and cultural contexts. This means, in turn, that our positions in a culture, a time, and a place affect what we know.

“These meanings are varied and multiple, leading the researcher to look for the complexity of views rather than narrow the meanings into a few categories or ideas. The goal of research, then, is to rely as much as possible on the participants’ views of the situation. Often these subjective meanings are negotiated socially and historically. In other words, they are not simply imprinted on individuals but are formed through interactions with others (hence social constructivism) and through historical and cultural norms that operate in individuals’ lives” (Creswell 2007: 20-21).

 I will answer the following questions that social construction theory poses: What is cosplay and what are the properties that make it up? Who wears these costumes and how are they made? How is cosplay constructed, both literally and figuratively? Why are things made in certain ways and what do they express? Finally, what are the historic and social contexts that have created the perfect environment for cosplay to exist in?

A Brief Introduction to the life of the Youth of Japan and Cosplay

Japan exists as a dichotomy, a society that struggles for a balance between those who uphold strict social standards and values, and a people who are trying to be unique and understand themselves as individuals in a place with very few foreign citizens. Less than 1% of the total population of Japan is foreign, yet vast amounts of outside influences come into Japan through the various routes of our globalizing world. Japan, in turn, insulates itself by making technologies specific in such a way that they can sometimes only be produced in Japan, protecting their market and insulating them against outside corporate control of any kind. Donald Richie referred to this process as becoming “uniquely Japanese” (Richie 2000: NP). Furthermore, the people of this fairly young nation state (solidified in the late 1800’s) are fighting to understand their national identity alongside their government’s attempts to finally detach Japan from the last remnants of American occupation. “Tokyo’s civic identity has been formed and reformed by fluctuating cycles of disaster, exodus, growth and change; and the social system – if there could be said to be only one – has created buffer zones and boundaries to help deal with such things” (Knafelc 2004: 13).

(Shibuya: JLG 2006)

Japanese students within their strict society are under tremendous pressure to succeed. Japan’s current population is estimated at around 127.5 million with 14 million of those people concentrated in Tokyo alone (State Dept. NP). (See Figures 1-1 and 1-2.) This means that in a country only slightly smaller in size than California, people must compete aggressively for jobs and educational opportunities. Schooling and placement exams are a matter of extreme stress and concentration for young people until their early to late twenties, depending on how far they pursue their education. The expected course of action after school is to find a company that will hopefully give lifetime employment and job security, but lately Japanese youth have been more reluctant to follow in their parents’ footsteps. 

In Harajuku, Overlooking the famous Harajuku Bridge that leads to Meiji Jingu Mae Shrine on the far side. (JLG 2006)

Understanding and Defining Cosplay

Cosplay (コスプレ, kosupure) is a contraction (or portmanteau) of the English words “costume” and “play.” It is, more specifically, a Japanese subculture that focuses on dressing as characters from manga, anime, video games, Japanese live action television shows, fantasy movies, Japanese pop music bands, and sometimes pop culture icons from other countries.(See Figure 2-1 and 2-2 to see a youth cosplaying as the video game character “Link” from the Zelda Video Game Series.) Cosplayers gather in Harajuku and many other places to see others’ costumes, show off their own elaborate handmade creations, take lots of pictures of one another and in large groups, and participate in costume contests that have become so big that prizes can range from a free cell phone to a trendy boutique gift certificate. Magazines and fashion designers scour these streets, taking photos of cosplayers and the like, hoping to catch the next big wave in fashion and to in the future make profit from these pioneers. (See Figure 2-3 which displays a photographer on the Harajuku Bridge.)

(Photographer on the bridge. Possibly a scout? JLG 2006)

Cosplay has been called many things: an art form, a youth clique, a social event, a designing process, detachment from society, or even just something to do out of boredom. All of these things can be true, at least in part, but the essence of cosplay is that it is a form of expression for young people in the Japanese subculture that practices it. Alongside this expression is fruits fashion, also known as extreme fashion, which sprung up in Harajuku around the same time as cosplay. These two movements are important to understand both independently and together, because in many ways the members of both groups often overlap in various ways. Extreme fashion is the idea of creating an outfit that protests corporate fashion trends and is instead “initiated by the wearer” (Aoki 1). (See Figure 2-4 of some Fruits Fashion known as Kawaii “Cute” Overload.) Cosplay, specifically, is the act of dressing up as a character, person, or creature from an anime, manga, movie, music group, or other Japanese pop culture genre. People who cosplay “take on the role of” their character for an entire day or weekend. The construction of the costume is done by the wearer and involves very little purchasing of items from stores if one is considered a “core” practitioner. (See Figure 2-5.)

Cosplay in Japan is a matter of being a part of one of the tribes that have formed in relation to its practice. In Tokyo that means going to Harajuku and joining one of the many groups or cliques hanging out by Meiji Jingu Mae every weekend. (See Figure 2-6.) One must become an insider to even get the slightest glimpse into a cosplayer’s life during the week, to go behind the bright makeup and hand-crafted clothing they wear, and the identity they take on as their own each weekend. Most cosplayers who are considered core members of a group have several outfits that they have spent tedious hours carefully crafting to perfection. The looks they create are a direct representation of the ideal they wish to express. It is an original response to societal pressures; a visual art form of expression that manifests itself through the idea of becoming another person through an outfit, makeup, and alternate attitude from normal, everyday life.    

The Historic Context of the Cosplay Sub Culture

It is said that cosplay became popular in the late eighties, but no one is sure why the trend first got started. It is pretty much impossible to get only one answer from anyone about the roots of cosplay in Japan. Some say it was because Star Wars and Star Trek conventions had brought with them to Japan people dressed as characters. In turn there were Japanese who took the idea to a whole new level. Others say it was initiated by the trendy new wave fashion artists on the streets and a natural result of fashion experimentation.

Some people argue that Nov Takahashi (from a Japanese studio called Studio Hard) specifically coined the term “cosplay” as a contraction of the English-language words “costume play” while he was attending Worldcon in the 1980s. It is said that he was so impressed by the hall and masquerade costuming there that he reported about it frequently in Japanese science fiction magazines and further encouraged cosplay as a way to promote anime series in Japan. (Cosplay 2007: NP). He has said in public appearances that he worries some people become too obsessed with costumes, and have less enthusiasm for the series itself, but still promotes cosplay avidly. Again, this point is debatable, even though Takahashi himself said he invented the word, since cosplay is a word made by combining two words, something that happens quite frequently in Japan. Karaoke and Pokemon are also words made by combining two words together.

Where to go and what to do: Introducing Harajuku

 TCVB said this of the famed Harajuku District in Tokyo, Japan, “Fashionable Harajuku is the perfect soft-landing in Tokyo with its cosmopolitan air and some of the best of traditional and modern Japan. Most people associate the name Harajuku with the Champs Elysees-like zelkova-lined avenue called Omotesando and a couple of nearby back streets, notably Takeshita-Dori, a cut-price fashion avenue teeming with teenagers.” (See Figure 3-1 for Takeshita Dori.)

Harajuku started out as a main contact point between Western and Eastern culture during occupation-period Japan until the 1950’s. Western clothing was suddenly available to the Japanese in bulk, and it would soon affect styles and fashions being worn by the residents of that area.  Although Western clothing was commonplace by the 1920’s, “Japan’s attitude to western clothes has been unfettered by the accompanying rules of class and status that clothes in Europe have been soaking in for hundreds of years (as indeed has Japan’s own system of indigenous dress). This, coupled with the country’s rapid postwar modernization into a hyper consumerist society, has led to an evolution of yofuku that sometimes looks nothing less than spectacular to the eyes of the westerner” (Keet 8).

Harajuku has been the name of the area around the Harajuku Station on the JR line within the Shibuya ward of Tokyo for many years, but did not achieve its current icon status until around the mid-1980’s. At the time Omotesando had been closed to traffic on Sundays (a “pedestrian paradise” known as Hoko-Ten in Japanese), and so the area in and around Harajuku seemed the perfect place for teens to go hang out, watch performances by young musicians and dancers trying to get their start, and where teens would exchange new ideas and concepts that would develop a myriad of youth subcultures unique, for many years, to that district alone (Aoki 1).

It became, by way of exchange and interaction of Tokyo’s young adults and teenagers, the spot for cutting-edge fashion in the nineties when teens initiated for the first time in shaping fashion the way they wanted it to look and feel rather than following designated trends that are so pushed in a capitalist society (Aoki 1). This fashion movement and the cosplay subculture have made Harajuku a special community for the many teens that travel there on weekends or afternoons once they are done with school or work. It is important to note that this community primarily gathers on weekends, particularly Sundays, and this is reflected in the entire community with businesses in the area closing by 9 P.M. on weekdays and staying open sometimes until the early hours of the morning on weekends. (See Figure 3-2 for what Harajuku Bridge looks like during weekday work hours.)

Harajuku Today

The youth of all social circles come up and spill out from Takeshite Dori (pronounced TA-KEH-SHTA-DO-REE), the street commonly known for its designer shops and fashions found no where else in the world. Takeshite Dori forms the edge of the Harajuku community and is also where businesses attempt to market to the local cosplay groups who hang out up the street. There are boutiques that specialize in socks, t-shirts, cosplay accessories such as wigs, mismatched outfits for the fashion movement, American vintage clothing from the 1970’s, and even stores that sell random accessories or jewelry. (See Figures 4-1, 4-2, and 4-3 for stores on the street.) Many western businesses like McDonalds, Doutor Coffee, and the Wolfgang Puck Express restaurant also dot the street.

When you pop back out from Takeshite Dori and cross the street towards Harajuku Station, leaving behind you the Snoopy Store and the Fashion Movement, you are immediately taken in by the sights of Harajuku Bridge. The main passage from the metro and JR lines to Meiji Jingu Mae Shrine, the sidewalk over Harajuku Bridge and across from Yoyogi Park is loaded with groups of teens who have set up parade blankets and strewn out their belongings on them to hang out for the day. Here, and especially on Sundays, you will commonly see the cosplayers and extreme fashion movement teens side by side: a few girls dressed in frilly Lolita Maid outfits trading candy or a few guys in Punk or Gothic garb trading cigarettes out across the blankets. They will look up causally from time to time, but are generally facing away from the large crowds of tourists from Japan and around the world who are making their way through this diverse setting to see the Shrine or Harajuku’s youth culture, UNLESS they are posing for pictures, which I will talk about more later on. Most often they are also listening to or watching someone playing guitar, singing, or dancing.

Cosplayers also come together to attend conventions, concerts, and public gatherings devoted specifically to cosplay. Every year there are cosplay conventions in Japan, and anime, video game, and sci-fi conventions also support the cosplay community. The world’s largest and most famous convention, Comiket (also known as Comic Market), is still held in the Odaiba Area of Tokyo, Japan bi-annually. Dojinshi, or fan produced manga, that cannot be found anywhere else in the world due to their rarity are sold here. Cosplayers from around the world often spend months or even years making costumes to wear to this convention. Cosplay parties held at amusement parks, nightclubs, and cafes now draw followers to new parts of Tokyo and greater Japan to interact with the ever-growing group.

Discussion

Construction and Creation

Cosplay is certainly a construction, and it has several fundamental properties, as well as nuanced components, that make it whole. Each cosplayer makes a conscious choice of what to express by picking a character and “look” to cosplay in their selected community. That community varies, depending on the location and age of the cosplayer, but the general idea is that being an accepted insider is one of the many keys to being a successful cosplayer. Each member will probably also choose a subgroup or category for their inspiration, whether that be Lolita, Goth, Anime, Manga, Visual K Rock, Hip Hop, Fruits Fashion, or Kawaii Overload (cute overload) (Macias and Evers 2007: various). (For an example of Visual Kei Cosplay see Figure 5-1.) One will note that many of these subgroups exist in their own right and are not distinctly a part of the cosplay community. A member of the hip hop group becomes one because they wish to be a part of that community every day, whereas a cosplayer of someone from the hip hop community is only doing so for a weekend (or other short period of time) to express an ideal they do not actually live in their everyday reality. When they dress up they take on not only the full appearance, but also the complete personality of that person or thing. In a way they are like actors playing parts in their own version of a community-wide, completely improvised play.

In Character

Many of the youth cosplay community can often be seen shopping and hanging out with other cosplayers who are also acting “in character.”  Examples of being “in character” by cosplay enthusiasts are similar to actors on a stage. Their actions could include making trademark facial expressions, or memorizing lines to say and reciting them out to people who pass by or interact with them. (See Figure 6-1: In Character “Aname.”)

An example of playing “in character” I witnessed while in Japan in the summer of 2006 that I found particularly interesting was a couple of girls dressed up like Strawberry Shortcake, a female character from the now-classic American children’s cartoon of the mid 1980’s. They had even memorized several lines from the show in English and spouted them out to me when I interviewed them. They were acting spunky, caring, and lighthearted just like Shortcake herself. They told me they had chosen Shortcake after purchasing a purse that had her drawn onto it. They found copies of the cartoon episodes online and watched several before making their outfits.

Making the Outfit

Creating the actual outfit one will wear is the most time consuming process of being a cosplayer. From start to finish it is an intricate process that begins with designing a pattern that must be sewn. Sewing often is done with a standard sewing machine, but intricate and delicate parts of an outfit must be hand-stitched. If one cannot make a part of a costume (which is a surprisingly rare occurrence with the amount of information available online guiding cosplayers to make virtually anything their costume needs) then items are often traded with other cosplayers or bought only under extreme circumstances. A frequently purchased item is the wig because they are so difficult and costly to make without proper supplies. This system of making clothing by hand and trading it with others is shocking to some adults who simply didn’t understand why their children suddenly wanted to learn how to sew, an art that is certainly not used much anymore with clothing being so readily available at low cost to the consumer. Cosplayers feel a kind of loyalty to their craft, however, and for the most part will refuse to spend any money on the pre-crafted designer cosplay clothing you can find in Harajuku specialty boutiques like Body Line and Takenoko.

Accessories are usually the most difficult part of a costume to make or complete with accuracy. Many anime characters wield weapons and thus it is difficult to create an accurate replica of a sword or gun without actually knowing how to do metallurgy. Most cosplayers will use a kind of synthetic material to create the weapon and mold it by hand. (See Figures 7-1 and 7-2 for complicated craft items.) Hair dye and styling are also an extremely important part of completing a character, with Japanese youth finding ways to shed traditional hair color for any in the rainbow. Neon hair colors are especially popular along with spiky hair styles that defy gravity with gels and sprays that are similar to glue in texture. Contact lenses of various colors (all over pigment or iris cover only) are also used to complete a landscape image.

So Who Are These Cosplayers?

Based on my observations, I have found that most cosplayers are between the ages of fourteen and twenty-four, making it a primarily-youth based subculture. Since most of these people are students, it is easy to see how cosplay is the perfect weekend escape from exams and stress (See Figure 8-1 for a crowded Harajuku weekend). Japanese students attend school six days a week, often also balancing a part-time job and/or an extra-curricular activity with a social life and time with the family at home.

It should be said, however, that there are hundreds of reasons people give when explaining why they choose to cosplay. Many people simply enjoy being part of such a fun and diverse group that accepts people no matter who they are, and has found a place to call home in Harajuku. While it is true that having fun is very important to a young person, and most young people will tell you that’s what it’s all about, it is easy to see that social expression is the deeper (often subconscious) meaning to this group’s intentions.

 “It is the sheer variety of styles to be found here – some in the form of fast moving trends, others belonging to little pockets of devoted followers of a subculture scene – that makes Tokyo fashion quite unlike that of any other city in the world” (Keet 2007). Truly Dr. Keet has here appropriately defined the unique concept that is Tokyo’s fashion scene. With so many options available, making a conscious choice of what to wear reflects a deep commitment to the ideal it expresses. One says a lot by projecting visually their ideal image, especially in a city like Tokyo where standing out among the suits and business attire really makes a statement. (See Figure 8-2 and 8-3 for youth and adult mainstream crowds.)

Tiffany Godoy also has some excellent words to apply to Japan’s youth expressions. “Japan’s youth culture has always evolved in relationship to what preceded it, with the kids – typical of youth everywhere – seeking a new identity separate from the one dictated by standard social norms” (Godoy 2007).

Fashion as an Identity Marker

In Victoria Chambers’ book, “Kickboxing Geishas: How Modern Japanese Women are Changing their Nation,” she describes to us that fashion takes a very important stance in expressing oneself in Japanese culture. The old saying, “Don’t judge a book by its cover,” seems to take no place in Japan. To go further on this idea, Chambers’ quotes Donald Richie, famous filmmaker and writer of Japanese culture for western audiences, as having said that “the surface truth is always the real truth. This is something that all Japanese people believe. You proclaim it, you put it on your name card and that’s who you are” (Chambers 31). This explains, Chambers says, why “there’s no such thing as casual Fridays at Japanese companies and why, if you are hiking in the countryside, you will see whole Japanese families dressed up like the Swiss Family Robinson. It’s not just a costume; those are their “hiking clothes” (Chambers 31-32).

So where does this idea of surface truth apply to cosplay? Since cosplayers are trying to stand out among a sea of those “dressing for their environment,” as Chambers put it, (meaning, in this case, salarymen, school uniformed teens, and others conforming to the masses) cosplay can be seen, in a way, as youth members creating a new environment, and then dressing to fill it appropriately (See figure 9-1 for the quaint Lolita). What is most interesting is that this environment takes no definite shape or style, and therefore possibilities of inhabiting it are seemingly limitless. There are a few social codes that go along with being a cosplayer, but really it’s all about the individual. In part, cosplayers did not have to work very hard to find a place to house their environment. Harajuku has been the place for fashion experimentation since the mid 1950’s. It was only natural that there would be room for cosplayers among the Fruits Fashion, the Goths, and the Hip Hop Crew (See figure 9-2 for more Visual Kei cosplayers). When cosplayers moved in, there was a natural space made for them on Harajuku Bridge for them to make a statement. What is special about cosplay is that it cannot fit any one category or definition socially. In many ways it is a hybrid of categories and definitions.

There lies a very important point: cosplay as a hobby can be an escape, but can also be a very important social statement in a country where a movement similar to the American social upheaval of the 1960’s has not yet really taken place. Women’s rights are just now being expanded and pushed past their social boundaries in Japan. Rather than a glass ceiling, Japanese women call their boundary a rice-paper ceiling, and in many ways that ceiling is tougher to break through than any other modernized country in the world. So here, in Harajuku, we find a lot of young women who are growing up and at the same time telling society in their own way that they don’t just want to fall into place when their rights are limited, and further more they will refuse to do so. Chambers makes a very important point about fashion in relation to women in Harajuku in her text:

“Gwen Stefani sings about the Harajuku girls and their “wicked style.” But Harajuku is also an anthropological petri dish of young women and how they are choosing to react to all the changes in their lives. From the thirty-plus-year distance of our own American women’s movement, it’s difficult to remember how many women were terrified of equal rights. In Japan you can see that same kind of “fear of flying” at work, in strangely theatrical, uniquely Japanese ways” (Chambers 32).

Fashion has always been a way to make a statement, and cosplay takes this concept one step further. In Japan, fashion trends are frequently initiated by individuals who were undergoing drastic changes in their simultaneously changing surroundings – the teens. Shoichi Aoki, who pioneered the magazine Fruits (which covered extreme fashion movements and experimentation in Tokyo) calls this idea, “fashion initiated by the wearer” (Aoki 2001). It makes sense that this happens because teens around the world are not given a voice of authority. Teens recognize their lack of an authoritative voice in society, and in turn they both subconsciously and consciously act out against their constraints. What better way get attention than dressing extremely, listening to loud music, and hanging out in large groups?

My thesis goes on from here, but really I just wanted to include these specific excerpts to prompt the following conversation. I want to know what YOU think. Personally, I feel that cosplay is a hobby that means something more than just making a costume for a convention. I think the root of the larger cosplay community means something more on both artistic and personal-expression levels. But I want to know what American cosplayers and Japanese cosplayers think about my conclusions. Is it something more? Or is it just a fun weekend out? Is there subconscious meaning beneath it? Or is it just another fad?

 I truly believe there's something more here, but I want to hear what you think.

 Patiently Waiting and Hoping for some constructive responses,

 Lady Jones