cosplay

English

An example of cosplay: A woman cosplaying as the title character from Sailor Moon.

Etymology

Borrowed from Japanese コスプレ (kosupure), which is a contraction of コスチュームプレイ (kosuchūmu purei), from a blend of English costume + play.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈkɒz.pleɪ/, /ˈkɒs.pleɪ/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈkɑz.pleɪ/, /ˈkɑs.pleɪ/, (hyperforeign) /ˌkoʊˈspleɪ/

Noun

cosplay (countable and uncountable, plural cosplays)

1. (uncountable) The art or practice of costuming oneself as a (usually fictional) character.
   • 2003, Cosplay Girls: Japan's Live Animation Heroines:

     Men, of course, also participate in cosplay and all its attending events, but women make up the greater numbers.

   • 2006, Lunning, Frenchy, Mechademia 1: Emerging Worlds of Anime And Manga, page 75:

     The environments and spaces created for and by cosplay provide cosplayers with a variety of spaces for social interactions.

   • 2010, Levi, Antonia; McHarry, Mark; Pagliassotti, Dru, Boys' Love Manga, page 5:

     It didn't take long for anime cons and cosplay to become a part of popular culture fandom in the West […]

2. (countable) A skit or instance of this art or practice.
   • 2010, Bowman, Sarah Lynne, The Functions of Role-playing Games, page 29:

     Central to the activity of cosplay is elaborate costuming, though some cosplays are enacted using a game system.

   • 2010, Cooper-Chen, Anne, Cartoon Cultures: The Globalization of Japanese Popular Media, page 121:

     According to a student from France who went to Japan to study Japanese, "Universities in France are like Halloween when otaku students engage in these cosplays. They take Japanese language because of anime, but they see after a few classes that it's hard and not fun. Many drop out" (author interview, 2009).

   • 2012, Hunter, Dan; Lobato, Ramon; Richardson, Megan, Amateur Media: Social, cultural and legal perspectives:

     Popular cosplays include, for example, characters from the Final Fantasy range of games […]

Coordinate terms

• dress-up

Translations

subculture centered on dressing as characters

• Arabic: كُوسْبْلَاي‎ m (kusplay)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 角色扮演 (zh) (juésè bànyǎn), 色扮演秀 (sèbànyǎnxiù), 角演 (juéyǎn)

• Dutch: cosplay m
• Esperanto: rolkostumado
• Finnish: cosplay, pukuilu
• French: cosplay m, costumade f
• Galician: cosplay
• German: Cosplay n
• Italian: cosplay m or m pl
• Japanese: コスプレ (kosupure)
• Korean: 코스프레 (koseupeure)
• Marathi: कॉस्प्ले (kŏsple)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: cosplay n

  Nynorsk: cosplay n

• Persian: کوزپلی‎ (kospley)
• Portuguese: cosplay m or f
• Russian: коспле́й m (kospléj), коспле́й m (kosplɛ́j)
• Spanish: cosplay m
• Swedish: cosplay
• Tagalog: cosplay
• Thai: คอสเพลย์ (kɔ́ɔs-plee)
• Ukrainian: коспле́й m (kospléj)

Verb

cosplay (third-person singular simple present cosplays, present participle cosplaying, simple past and past participle cosplayed)

1. (intransitive) To costume oneself as a character.

   She cosplayed at the manga convention.

   • 2022 December 23, Marina Hyde, “Who can doubt the futuristic brilliance of Sunak and co? They’ve given us driverless government”, in The Guardian‎^[1]:

     Senior politicians have cosplayed as train drivers, ambulance workers, Border Force officials – the list goes on.

2. (transitive) To costume oneself as (a character).

   She cosplayed Sailor Moon at the manga convention.

3. (figurative, often derogatory, transitive) To adopt the behavior and mannerisms of another.
   • 2022 March 17, Aila Slisco, “Ukrainian UN Ambassador Accuses Russians of Engaging in 'Nazi Cosplay'”, in Newsweek‎^[2], retrieved 2022-03-18:

     Why has the Russian Federation decided to cosplay the Nazi Third Reich by attacking the peaceful neighboring state and plunging the region into war?

   • 2022 May 30, Rebecca Solnit, “US mass shootings will continue until the majority can overrule the minority”, in The Guardian‎^[3]:

     […] turning conservative white men into amateur commandos cosplaying war wherever they liked and the US into a war zone.

   • 2022 August 27, Drachinifel, Type 1936A / Narvik class - Guide 298‎^[4], archived from the original on 29 August 2022, 2:44 from the start:

     Whilst their stability was generally an improvement on earlier German destroyers, as the vessels no longer displayed a strong desire to cosplay as U-boats, the main armament proved to be something of a problem.

Coordinate terms

• dress up

Derived terms

• cosfamous
• cosplayer
• crossplay

Descendants

• → Norwegian: cosplay
• → Portuguese: cosplay
• → Russian: коспле́й (kospléj)
• → Spanish: cosplay
• → Thai: คอสเพลย์ (kɔ́ɔs-plee)
• → Ukrainian: коспле́й (kospléj)

Translations

to costume oneself as a character

• Esperanto: rolkostumigi (transitive)
• Finnish: pukuilla
• French: cosplayer, costumader
• Italian: fare un cosplay
• Japanese: コスプレする
• Russian: коспле́ить impf (kospléitʹ)
• Swedish: cosplaya
• Thai: คอสเพลย์ (kɔ́ɔs-plee)

See also

• gijinka

Further reading

• cosplay on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• Calypso, calypso

Norwegian Bokmål

Etymology

Borrowed from English cosplay.

Noun

cosplay n (definite singular cosplayet, indefinite plural cosplay, definite plural cosplaya or cosplayene)

1. cosplay (The practice)
2. cosplay (A specific instance)

Related terms

• cosplaye (verb)

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

Borrowed from English cosplay.

Noun

cosplay n (definite singular cosplayet, indefinite plural cosplay, definite plural cosplaya)

1. cosplay (The practice)
2. cosplay (A specific instance)

Related terms

• cosplaya (verb)

Portuguese

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English cosplay.

Noun

cosplay m or f (uncountable)

1. cosplay (art of dressing as characters)
2. cosplay (instance of dressing as a character)

Quotations

For quotations using this term, see Citations:cosplay.

Related terms

• cospobre

Spanish

Etymology

From English cosplay.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /kosˈplei/ [kosˈplei̯]
• Rhymes: -ei

Noun

cosplay m (plural cosplays)

1. cosplay