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Geoff
21st August 2006, 14:18
I began my MA training in Moo Duk Kwan TKD, a Korean deviation from main-line Shotokan. Over the years I trained in freestyle karate (Shotokan/TKD combo), "American Shotokan" with PKA national champs and, finally, traditional Shotokan karate. While I wish at times I that I had a more pure Shotokan lineage I beleive that deviations from the traditional Shotokan cannon that I have been taught have been instructive in a number of ways. I have been exposed to other training styles, different interpretations of bunkai, different attitudes toward the emphasis on certain techniques (kicking in TKD, e.g.), etc. While much of what I learned before I found a home in traditional karate I have discarded from my personal training I think that I have benefitted from this experience too.

I have two questions regarding this eclectic experience:

1. How many other people have had simialr training experiences?

2. What do you feel are the benefits and the costs/liabilities of training in the deviations from the main-line traditional styles rather than purely in the root-styles themselves.

(note: I understand that Japanese karate in general and Shotokan in particular are deviations from the original Okinawan systems, but for the purposes of argument here I am assuming that they have developed independently to the point that they have become root systems themselves.)

Kyro Lantsberger
28th August 2006, 02:42
I know that this a bit of a tangent from what you meant, but I think it applies. This is honestly not a joke, either. My luck really is this bad.

I was a kid during the ninja boom of the 1980s, and collected Ninja magazines with Harunaka Hoshino in them, to find out later that his credentials were limited.

When I got a bit older, I finally got involved in TKD. Being from a small town, it was my only option for martial art training.

Later, my TKD school added what was purported to be traditional Okinawan Martial Arts. I admit to having spent some time in Juko kai as a result.

My path also led me to a few months of training in Kaze Arashi Ryu Aikijujitsu. I had some suspicions regarding some of its material, but had no idea of the true depth of the issue until I searched it on this forum.

I finally found my home more than a decade ago when I discovered a Chinese Internal MA club started by an individual who had lived for several years in Taiwan training with master instructors, and took numerous trips back between Taiwan and China for continuous exposure to the remaining masters. To see and experience the level of corrections from a legitimate lineage is a universe apart from these other environments. I am speaking from the perspective of Chinese styles, but I can only assume the same feeling exists in traditional Karate.

Skills and solid training are trasferrable. Ive spent a great deal of time in submission grappling, and the principles I picked up doing push hands and chin-na are something that I use constantly.

In terms of things gained from training at those other places? I would have to say camaraderie. This is something that is becoming more and more important to me as time goes on. The type of person who trains in MA to begin with is somewhat unique, and shared time with like individuals is precious.

Nadelman
28th August 2006, 19:34
2. What do you feel are the benefits and the costs/liabilities of training in the deviations from the main-line traditional styles rather than purely in the root-styles themselves.

If one accepts the premise that the knowledge from the past masters of Karate is passed on through the kata, then only when one is trained in true traditional (orthodox -original-unchanged) Karate (and Kobudo), from someone with a bona fide lineage, can claim:

1) actual knowledge of the correct kata and its movemements;
2) the true bunkai (or explaination of the hidden meaning and knowledge from the kata) that was intended to be passed down. Kata without bunkai is empty.

Non-traditional and modern styles of Karate do have merits and its students may be very good, but the original knowledge has not been passed on to them and they do not benefit from the 600 + years of development of Okinawan Karate.

Basically, they have started the development cycle from the beginning.

hectokan
29th August 2006, 14:06
Are we talking about traditional hard line (change for a reason)do understand deviants or are we talking about fly by night mix & mash without reason(don't understand the concept to begin with) Mcdojo deviants?

Brad Burklund
29th August 2006, 18:10
I’ll have to go with Hectokan on this one. There’s a large difference between someone putting together a large compendium of disparate and unwieldy techniques and selling them to the ignorant, and someone who has a good idea and good skills and then running with it.

Also, I’ll say that one has to define kata. If you use the traditional thrust that kata is karate, then there are a host of self-titled karate-ka that are good, but yet don’t fall under this label of tight fisted kata lovers and users.

Kata, is it a one size fits all, principle laden mnemonic device to allow the past to live in the future? Or is it a claustrophobic entity that exists as some archetypal sequence of movement that is unalterable within stylistic concerns, yet is malleable enough to be slightly different from style to style?

How does one train kata to utility if memorizing set action pieces even if they are derived into bunkai? Why not just train the bunkai and leave the kata alone if kata is just a tome of principals and various uses of technique? Especially given modern technology: books, DVDs, internet…etc.

Well, my answer is that regardless of where you come from, or what claim you lay to origin or authenticity, it is less the kata or the traceable history of what you have, but more the way you practice and utilize your tools. If you have a teacher who can show you these things, great! If it is true that someone who has a well documented background has more facility communicating these things because of exposure, great! But I think it is in how you train, and not in what you claim, that really distinguishes the practitioner.

However, when comparing style to its use, it can be similar to a great teacher with a poor student: it has always been on the shoulders of the student to espouse and show his education, not the other way around.

Geoff
30th August 2006, 01:54
My personal experience was a mixed-bag. I think the time I spent in Moo Duk Kwan was, for the most part, time well-spent. I am not so sanguine about the time I spent in free-style karate. Hectokan is right on the money. Some of the changes I have observed between MDk and Shotokan were made for a reason and reflect and emerging understanding of TKD as a sport (although I now have voted with my feet and spent the past 10 years or so in Shotokan). I also feel, as Kyro stated, that as I age the camraderie of training, as well as the experience I have had with good instructors, has become more important to me than when I chsaing trophies in my teens and twenties.

Nadelman, while I respect your opinion, I think your premise that only koryu arts possess the key to unlocking kata (and that kata bunkai is the end all and be all of karate) is off base. I think there are few Okinawan MA today that can honestly say they draw upon 600+ years of tradition. My suspicion, anecdotedly confirmed by word of month and Bishop's book on Okinawan karate, is that even the most traditional Okinawan styles have changed their training in the last 50-100 years.

I thank you all for your opinions. You know, as I get older (and slower) I spend more time thinking about both wasted opportunity and those paths which I have unintentionally discovered.

Nadelman
30th August 2006, 05:27
Nadelman, while I respect your opinion, I think your premise that only koryu arts possess the key to unlocking kata (and that kata bunkai is the end all and be all of karate) is off base. I think there are few Okinawan MA today that can honestly say they draw upon 600+ years of tradition. My suspicion, anecdotedly confirmed by word of month and Bishop's book on Okinawan karate, is that even the most traditional Okinawan styles have changed their training in the last 50-100 years.

It is very true that most, if not all MA in Okinawa have changed their training over the years. This is to be expected if an art is to evolve. However, staying true to the propriety of the Kata does not mean that one is restricted from interpreting new applications and developing new training methods. Just the opposite, it is this structure that provides the framework from which to develop and evolve.

epramberg
18th September 2006, 20:56
I have seen some of the offshootes of Wado Karate. The traditional ogranized sects deviate enough in content, but most of the modern versions of Wado have lost all of the founding principals of Wado. In essence these sects should stop using that name all together. I will not specuate on how effective they are, but I will say that it is not the same martial art.

Jay Vail
4th October 2006, 01:07
Non-traditional and modern styles of Karate do have merits and its students may be very good, but the original knowledge has not been passed on to them and they do not benefit from the 600 + years of development of Okinawan Karate.

Basically, they have started the development cycle from the beginning.

You know, for years I searched the sources trying to establish/verify karate's ancient roots, but everything I have found seems to indicate that what we call karate doesn't seem to be older than the late 1700s and much of it seems even younger still, dating only from about Matsumura's time, the mid-1800s. I wish it weren't so, but sadly, that seems to be it.