Should we still teach Japanese in the dojo?

[Devil]

Funny story here related to the use of Japanese / English in the martial arts.

I once had a very nice and capable karate instructor. He began practicing martial arts in the late 60s under a Japanese instructor that spoke shitty English. Sometimes when we were training and my instructor wanted us to repeat a technique, he'd go "Same, same!" "Same, same!" I always wondered what the **** he said that for.

Then one day he showed me an old video of his instructor teaching a class. During the course of the video I heard the old Japanese instructor saying it. But I instantly realized something my instructor apparently had not. The Japanese guy was trying to say "Same thing" to get his students to repeat a technique. But it came out as "same sing". My instructor had misunderstood and thought he was saying "same, same." And he repeated that for decades as a teacher because he thought it sounded Japanesey.

So you had an English speaking white guy imitating a Japanese guy who was trying his damndest to speak proper English. lol.

[NeilG]

For the record, I can see the value more in Judo. But most karate nerds don't need it at all.

I agree: you don't need it if you stick to your home club, never travel, never bring in an instructor from another country, basically the local-only head-in-the-sand approach that most people do. But even then, you have to concoct some standard terms in your native language to cover concepts or techniques that already have perfectly usable terms in Japanese. It's like calling "carburetor" "that gas-air combiner thing".

[Devil]

It's like calling "carburetor" "that gas-air combiner thing".

lol. No, it's not like that at all. Carburetor is not a universal word used in every country despite the national language.

It's like calling "carburetor" carburador or carburateur or carburet or gaznik.

[RoninRyu1980]

My instructor had misunderstood and thought he was saying "same, same." And he repeated that for decades as a teacher because he thought it sounded Japanesey.
So you had an English speaking white guy imitating a Japanese guy who was trying his damndest to speak proper English. lol.

I also had an instructor who had misunderstanding of the Japanese language. Apparently his Okinawan instructor was teaching kicks and kept saying "use koshi". Koshi means hip or waist in Japanese but my instructor and his fellow classmates misunderstood it to mean striking surface used, the ball of the foot. Which seems to have been misconstrued by most non-Japanese instructors.

[NeilG]

lol. No, it's not like that at all. Carburetor is not a universal word used in every country despite the national language.

It's like calling "carburetor" carburador or carburateur or carburet or gaznik.

I meant in the sense of making up a technical term for something you already have a technical term for. Most of the Japanese terms we use are jargon, they are not used in everyday Japanese language or at least not for the purpose we put them to. So dismissing use of Japanese out of hand as simply culture-worship or play-acting is incorrect. Sometimes it is those things but for many of us it is a useful tool.

Even the words that aren't really technical are useful. Surely you acknowledge that for international competition, it is useful for the ref to say "hajime" to start and "yame" or "mate" to stop so that any competitor can understand regardless of native language? Perhaps at international seminar it would be a good thing for us all to be counting in the same language as we go through drills?

[Devil]

Surely you acknowledge that for international competition, it is useful for the ref to say "hajime" to start and "yame" or "mate" to stop so that any competitor can understand regardless of native language?

Yes, I do.

[W. Rabbit]

Japanese is a cool language. You should learn some whether or not you study martial arts of any kind.

It's funny how much improper "Dojo slang" could be improved with some basic language lessons...

Native speakers **** up their own language all the time, too, so why is it wrong when an English speaker mispronounces "foot" in Japanese?

Sometimes learning a language fluently is about saying it wrong many times...and just getting the right corrections. Learning English is no different.

[Devil]

And the Japanese culture is super cool to study when you're learning about how to be an honorable martial artist.

Be sure to start at the chapter where you throw babies into the air and catch them with your bayonet.

[dewey]

Non-Japanese folks using Japanese terminology when studying/training/playing a Japanese martial art shouldn't seem so outlandish on the face of it. It should be done merely out of deference to the cultural heritage of the martial art as well as a serving a very practical purpose of providing a common lingo that unites all participants no matter what their native language is.

It is absurd and obnoxious when gaijin try to be more Japanese than the Japanese. It's the same thing as suburban white kids try to do the gangsta bit...it's simultaneously comical & pathetic. Respect the culture, but don't pretend you're Tom Cruise in the Last Samurai.

I study a koryu sword art. The names of the techniques intentionally defy easy explanation (and translation). That was intentional. It was meant to obfuscate the martial application of the technique. It also preserved the oral transmission aspect of the koryu arts. No mystical BS...just old-fashioned secrecy so no other sword school learned your techniques so that they could devise a counter.

[W. Rabbit]

And the Japanese culture is super cool to study when you're learning about how to be an honorable martial artist.

Be sure to start at the chapter where you throw babies into the air and catch them with your bayonet.

Is that like the chapter of the US Army skinning Native American Iroquois children?

Really, you want that derail? Japanese language and culture aren't sexy because they have skeletons in the closet. Oh the horrors...