|
Post by Glutton4Punishment on Jun 29, 2013 22:00:50 GMT -5
Another note, this is not meant to spark debate over how useful Kata is. I personally think it IS useful. It just isn't able to stand in for sparring, the two need to supplement each other.
|
|
odee
Global Moderator
Kyokushin 10 years - Brazilian Jujitsu 3 years - Muay Thai 2 years.
Posts: 1,286
|
Post by odee on Jun 30, 2013 18:56:29 GMT -5
Most people who train kata aren't doing it right no matter where they come from. I don't train kata right. I can't use kata as a defense, I'm just not that good and I've only ever seen one person who was that good. To use kata as a defense you need to have almost perfect reading ability and know what your opponent is up to at about the same time as they do.
|
|
|
Post by kokoro on Jun 30, 2013 21:56:35 GMT -5
forms in china go back for further then the band. they go back centuries before the band. the manual theory sounds more plausible to me. the way it was explained to me was kata was a catalog of the masters techniques. g4p, i know your not debating that, its a habit of mine from y/a
odee, as for most people not training kata right, its more like most people dont teach kata right. were you taught to use kata in a self defense or sparing? its doubt full.
kata was meant to be a category of techniques, it was meant to help you open your mind. in order to be able to use kata in a self defense or sparing you will need to go back to basics. take one technique that all you need anyway, and just use that technique to defend everything. when you understand how to do that you will begin to understand kata. i like to take the down guard technique and start people with that one. and have people just use that one technique for the week. for almost everything. from various locks and strikes to chokes. if you cant see all this from one basic technique then you cant see it in kata. i have been training this with possum as well. he isnt sure of applications for his tkd forms, the same principles apply to them. it doesnt matter if there korean, chinese, veitmanese, muay boran or okinawan forms they are all based off of the same principals.
|
|
|
Post by Glutton4Punishment on Jul 1, 2013 14:25:46 GMT -5
I'm sure forms and Kata from all styles go much further back than their bans. I'm not so much asking if the bans are the reason that arts have Kata to begin with, but I would assume that pre-ban the practitioners would place a much heavier focus on Kumite than many schools do now. I'm wondering if the danger of being exposed due to injury shifted the focus on Kumite over into a greater focus on Kata out of necessity is all. It'd be arrogant to say that forms are the byproduct of any ban on fighting arts.
My hypothesis is this: For the founding of any style, it had to have been developed through trial and error or it would not have been effective for anybody. I consider Karate to be among the more effective styles out there for the most part as long as it's trained well, so I definitely believe that it's earliest days consisted of hard sparring and trial and error with no Kata. Later on for the purpose of handing it down, Kata would have been developed. Then even though Kata would be used as a valuable training tool, Kumite for the sake of continual trial and error for the practitioners to get the proper feel for the art would be used as well. Over time this would grow, and Karate in my mind would have a constant focus on trial and error so that every Karateka could learn to understand their own strengths and weaknesses as best as possible. Then the government decides that the practice of martial arts should be outlawed, and the people who refuse to let their art die practice in secret. They can't continually go home without black eyes, bruises, cut lips, etc, so they shift their focus from trial and error to continue developing the art to conserving the art out of necessity. This causes a heavier focus on Kata and a smaller focus on Kumite and the Karate that spreads all around the world continues this trend.
This said, I haven't trained in Karate in Japan, so maybe most schools DO focus on Kumite much more. This is only a hypothesis that popped up in my brain while I was at the swimming pool the day I posted this. I'm just wondering if my little hypothesis has much basis in how the arts developed in reality.
|
|
odee
Global Moderator
Kyokushin 10 years - Brazilian Jujitsu 3 years - Muay Thai 2 years.
Posts: 1,286
|
Post by odee on Jul 1, 2013 17:56:44 GMT -5
Kokoro. I was taught that kata is a technique guide to be modified for use, not a be all and end all of your style but I personally do use it as an attacking pattern, there is just a certain flow to most katas that makes them easy to string together as an attacking combination. But when you see someone successfully do it almost move for move that way you question if it possibly can be the be all and end all.
Glutton. If you have a good teacher you'll find that training in the homeland isn't all that different to regular training, just longer hours with more like-minded people to spar with. The big benefit of training in the homeland of your martial art is getting more chances to spar with other people who have also made the commitment to travel for better training in a school that's open longer hours to cater to more students.
I got the opportunity to travel to Japan through a Kempo group that trained across the road from the Kyokushin school where I trained. One of their guys had to drop out last minute so they dropped the invite at our school for anyone who could pony up the money for the trip. I was lucky to be in that financial position. The Kempo head-man in Japan liked my attitude enough in the first week of training that he released me for the second week of the visit to train with a Kyokushin school he knew of at the other end of town. Both schools were packed full of people who'd travelled to train at those homeland schools and the training was great but it was the attitude of the travellers who made that training possible more so than anything special from the locals.
|
|
|
Post by kokoro on Jul 1, 2013 20:20:01 GMT -5
g4p perhaps this will help a bit. and im chopping this up a bit from a few sources. and also shorting the storys a bit.
matsumura one of the people considered the grandfather of modern karate, only lost one fight ever. against the chinese sailor who's name was chinto. matsumura was know as a general practicer, if there was a weakness he though he had he added that into his trained, he was in charge of nt only guarding the kings of okinawa but also training their other body guards. so when he lost that fight, he trained under chinto, until chinto went back to china. after this he created the kata know as chinto.
odee, i view kata as a manual, as for technical guide yes that could be similar in meaning. there is an old saying karate begins and ends with kata.
you have two though processes one, is that each sequence is meant to end the situation, the next is the the end of the kata is meant to. which one is right? well does it really matter. as long as the techniques work in the end that to me is what matters. but also as you advance in understanding of kata, you can take a movements from several kata, and use them, rather then just drawing from one. when i teach applications i try not to get into absolutes. some people i see and know they teach absolutes when it comes from kata. for example you have people that say kata was intended only for one attacker, and to some extent i think that is true. but why cant you use it against multiple, i think it should be both when it can apply.
yes the technique is meant to be modified, and not always meant to be used in order. the difference between the beginner technique and the advance technique is the application of that technique. if you take your first kata pinan nidan, the opening movement is a downguard, with a very slight modification it turns into an armbar
|
|