Thomas G. Endres of the University of Northern Colorado, United States, will be presenting a keynote titled “Costume Conversations: Resilience and Representation in Cosplay and Beyond” at The 13th Asian Conference on Media, Communication & Film (MediAsia2022), which will be held alongside The 3rd Kyoto Conference on Arts, Media & Culture (KAMC2022), October 17–20, 2022.
The MediAsia/KAMC2022 Organising Committee is currently calling for papers to be presented at the event. Submit your abstracts by August 1, 2022, to participate.
To participate in MediAsia/KAMC2022 as an audience member, please register for the conference.
This plenary will also be available for IAFOR Members to view online. To find out more, please visit the IAFOR Membership page.
Abstract
Costume Conversations: Resilience and Representation in Cosplay and Beyond
For some, dressing up in costume provides an opportunity to be someone they are not. But for many, the costume allows the person to dress in a way that shows who they really are. In this presentation, Endres shares a preview of his forthcoming book My Costume, Myself: Celebrating Stories of Cosplay and Beyond (Kirk House Press). Beginning with a brief history of costuming and cosplay, and examining the impact of costume messages on self-identification and portrayal, the address focuses primarily on photos and interviews conducted by Endres over a year-long period in venues ranging from New York City to Los Angeles, California. The scenes range from Comic Cons and Festivals to Old West historical reenactments in the streets of Deadwood, South Dakota, United States, and the costumes run the gamut from superheroes to anime/manga to Mediaeval to drag. Both the resilience of subjects, and the ways in which they choose to represent themselves, is found in stories related to grief, health, ability/disability, gender identification, and family relationships. Of particular interest are questions related to depictions of race and culture, and the continuum between “appropriate” and “appropriation.” With the goal of celebration, these stories serve to legitimise and validate this increasingly popular cultural phenomenon.
Speaker Biography
Thomas G. Endres
University of Northern Colorado, United States
Thomas G. Endres (PhD, University of Minnesota) is Professor of Communication Studies at the University of Northern Colorado, USA, where he serves as coordinator to both COMM's online degree completion program and the Leadership Studies minor. Teaching/research interests include rhetoric and popular culture, storytelling within cultural communities, leadership and group dynamics, and pedagogical tools such as study abroad and online learning. His favourite course to teach is a short-term summer course in Barcelona, Spain. He is author/photographer of the book Sturgis Stories: Celebrating the People of the World's Largest Motorcycle Rally and has published dozens of book chapters and conference proceedings on topics such as father-daughter relationships, tattoos as family identifiers, and the Rocky Horror Picture Show. In 2015 he published the definitive article on Ernest Bormann’s Symbolic Convergence Theory in Wiley-Blackwell's International Encyclopedia of Communication Theory and Philosophy. Tom has delivered over 230 conference presentations worldwide, including TEDtalk ArenaCircle and keynote addresses at conferences in Japan, China, Thailand (where he also served as conference chair for MEDCOM 2016), and the UK. Awards received include Outstanding Professor from the National Speakers Association, Administrator of the Year from the National Communication Association’s National States Advisory Council, and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Rocky Mountain Communication Association. He is currently writing a new photo-ethnography book on costume and identity and will co-author the next edition of Sellnow's The Rhetorical Power of Popular Culture: Considering Mediated Texts.
