Because mammoths, today’s Rhymes With Orange:
(#1) Advances in Mammoth Science: early scientists encountering Mammuthus primigenius var. nudus
What we have here has been seen by some as an early invention of a primitive form of clothing for warmth in cold climates and by others as a prehistoric variety of cosplay in a non-primate mammal — a classic case of disputes over adaptations that might serve basic survival needs or might manifest drives towards play and art.
Cosplay. From Wikipedia:
(#2) Nintendo x Diablo Cosplay Was The Star Of [2017] Anime Expo (link)
Cosplay, a contraction of the words costume play, is a hobby in which participants called cosplayers wear costumes and fashion accessories to represent a specific character. Cosplayers often interact to create a subculture, and a broader use of the term “cosplay” applies to any costumed role-playing in venues apart from the stage. Any entity that lends itself to dramatic interpretation may be taken up as a subject and it is not unusual to see genders switched. Favorite sources include anime, cartoons, comic books, live-action films, television series and video games.
The rapid growth in the number of people cosplaying as a hobby since 1990s has made the phenomenon a significant aspect of popular culture in Japan and some other parts of Asia and in the Western world. Cosplay events are common features of fan conventions and there are also dedicated conventions and local and international competitions, as well as social networks, websites and other forms of media centered on cosplay activities.
The term “cosplay” was coined in Japan in 1984. It was inspired by and grew out of the practice then-known as fan costuming at science fiction conventions, beginning with the 1st World Science Fiction Convention in New York City in 1939.
Cosplay is a female-dominated hobby that flourishes in traditionally male fan spaces (at comic cons and gamer cons, in particular), attracting many teenage fans.
Cosplay is not unknown in other species — wolves dressing up in sheep’s clothing, for instance — but most reliable reports have a clear function or purpose, beyond playful or artistic display.
The title of this posting is a play on the book title Naked Came the Stranger. From Wikipedia:
(#3)
Naked Came the Stranger is a 1969 novel written as a literary hoax poking fun at the American literary culture of its time. Though credited to “Penelope Ashe”, it was in fact written by a group of twenty-four journalists led by Newsday columnist Mike McGrady.
McGrady’s intention was to write a book that was both deliberately terrible and contained a lot of descriptions of sex, to illustrate the point that popular American literary culture had become mindlessly vulgar [with the best-seller lists dominated by the likes of Harold Robbins and Jacqueline Susann]. The book fulfilled the authors’ expectations and became a bestseller in 1969; they revealed the hoax later that year, further spurring the book’s popularity.
September 26, 2017 at 5:39 pm |
From Sim Aberson (in the Miami area) on Facebook: