外国人最想和你聊的时事话题：角色扮演

　What is cosplayer　什么是角色扮演
     Cosplay, short for "costume play", is a type of performance art in which participants don costumes and accessories to represent a specific character or idea. Characters are often drawn from popular fiction in Japan, but recent trends have included American cartoons and Sci-Fi. Favorite sources include manga, anime, tokusatsu, comic books, graphic novels, video games, hentai and fantasy movies. Any entity from the real or virtual world that lends itself to dramatic interpretation may be taken up as a subject. Inanimate objects are given anthropomorphic forms and it is not unusual to see genders switched, with women playing male roles and vice versa.
     Cosplayers often interact to create a subculture centered on role play. A broader use of the term cosplay applies it to any costumed role play in venues apart from the stage, regardless of the cultural context.
     Cosplayers typically come from the ranks of otaku-that is, fans of Japanese comic books, known as manga. They gather at public events such as comic-book and video game trade shows, as well as at dedicated cosplay parties at nightclubs or amusement parks. In Japan teenagers gather with like-minded friends in places like Tokyo's Harajuku district to engage in cosplay. Since 1998 Tokyo's Akihabara district has contained a large number of cosplay cafés, catering to devoted anime and cosplay fans. The waitresses at such cafés dress as game or anime characters; maid costumes are particularly popular. In areas outside of Japan, cosplay is primarily done at manga and anime conventions.
     The single largest event featuring cosplay is the semiannual doujinshi market, Comiket. This event, held in Japan during summer and winter, attracts hundreds of thousands of manga fans. Thousands of cosplayers congregate on the roof of the exhibition center. The largest event for cosplayers outside Asia is the annual San Diego Comic-Con held in the California city in the USA.The biggest event in the UK is the MCM Expo events at excel london
     Cosplayers in Japan refer to themselves as reiyā; pronounced"layer". Those who photograph players are called cameko, short for"Camera Kozō" or "Camera Boy". Originally the cameko give prints of their photos to players as gifts. Increased interest in cosplay events both on the part of photographers and cosplayers willing to model for them have led to formalisation of procedures at events such as Comiket. Photography takes place within a designated area removed from the exhibit hall.
     Cosplay为Costumeplay的缩写，即"角色扮演"，指的是通过穿上商业作品里各种角色的服饰，扮演成作品中的角色，范围包括动画（cartoon）、漫画（comic and animation）、电玩（video game）、视觉系乐团以及台湾独有的布袋戏（glove puppet show）等等。任何一个参与cosplay的人，都是copsplayer。在国内，cosplayer被简称为coser。