Fieldwork Reflection: Cosplay and Performance

“I think, in a way, I regret my cosplay… I don’t know how to explain it - and maybe I wouldn’t be feeling this way had I been more recognised. But maybe others didn’t comment on it as much because I wasn’t really alive with it. Kind of like wearing a mask and performing the myth - the performance may look the same from the outside, but the feel is different.” - Fieldwork Journal from 28th May, 2022, 18:25.

The above is from my fieldwork journal. Anthropologists typically carry these things with us, small notebooks to jot our feelings out in. It keeps us sane sometimes, in the field, when we’re surrounded by unfamiliar. It keeps us grounded. I don’t share from my fieldwork journal very often. Some anthropologists like to in their articles or book chapters, to demonstrate what was happening in the moment. I try to avoid it.

But I thought I needed to today for a reason. I wanted to capture, something that I’ve been having trouble articulating since I attended MCM London at the end of May. I’ve tried formulating it in more reasonable and articulate language, but sometimes the feeling of the moment just has way more power than whatever the English language may attempt to compile.

I’ve talked quite a bit about cosplay and performance. Never dwelled extensively on it, until now, but always about how cosplay is related to this idea of a story performed. Using their body, cosplayers take on the persona of a character and live it out in public spaces, whether those spaces be fan conventions or whether they be Instagram photo shoots.

Talking to cosplayers has reiterated this conception. During one conversation, a participant started by telling me that accuracy of costume was way more important than the performance. However, through the conversation, they constantly talked about how some people don’t have the skill or the money for a good costume and that’s fine, as long as the performance of the character makes them happy and feels true to them. When I pointed this out to them, they laughed and said I guess they were wrong - the performance is everything.

Others have said the same, though with less circular language to get there. Most started by repeating the same concept: it doesn’t matter what your costume looks like, what matters is the way you play when in the costume.

In the true name of the framework of anthropological research called “participant-observation”, I couldn’t just observe or chat, I had to also participate. I had to act myself.

I spent the last few months putting together my own cosplay. I’m still teaching myself to sew, so I don’t exactly have the skills to make my own costume. I didn’t really like the look of many of the costumes that were fully available for sale. So I decided to do it part-way, by grabbing pieces at charity shops and slowly compiling the costume that way.

I chose Chise from the Ancient Magus’ Bride for a few reasons. The first is that I absolutely love Magus’ Bride; it’s one of my favourite anime and I feel the connection to mythology and folklore. The second is that Chise is a red-head, which is an aspect of myself I didn’t always like, but wanted to embrace. The third is that her outfit is relatively simple, and filled with pieces that I felt I could easily find.

And so I went to MCM London dressed as Chise. Participating. Observing. But very much participating. And the result? It’s hard to say.

There were many people I met and spoke to in cosplay, and I enjoyed watching them and talking to them about their cosplay just as much as I usually do. But when it came to myself - my cosplay, my performance, my chat about it - it was a bit different. I was almost uncomfortable about it. My body was uncomfortable, my ego was uncomfortable. I felt awkward.

If someone had recognised and wanted a photo, I genuinely wouldn’t know what to do. I would have been overly awkward about the whole thing. But at the same time, the fact that no one did recognise it out loud, or comment on it to me, also made me uncomfortable and awkward.

I had heard from participants that being in costume meant that you were able to be less awkward than your normal self because you were able to be someone else for a few hours. I’m not sure if I truly felt that, but maybe it is, like my fieldwork journal said, because I wasn’t alive with it.

I don’t think a performance like this is something you can just put on and off without really thinking about it, or really giving it time to soak into you. Perhaps this is why crafting your own costume can be so beneficial. It gives you time to live with the form of the character you’re making. And by “really thinking” I don’t mean that cosplayers spend ages taking notes on their performance or anything. But I do believe that there is more to it than simply putting on a costume, some unspoken and inexplicable thing that makes cosplay what it is.

I think what I’m trying to get at is a better understanding of what I mean when I say “performance” when it comes to cosplay. What does this actually look like? I think we’ve seen a lot of cosplay performances, whether it be online or in person at cons. And for sure, knowing what cosplay looks like is an incredibly important question. But maybe more importantly would be the question: what does it feel like?