Disappearing History... [Archive] - MartialTalk.Com - Friendly Martial Arts Forum Community

exile

01-10-2009, 06:16 PM

Dear All,

I pose a question...does anyone see the Republic of Korea (Kukkiwon, WTF, & KTA) removing crucial portions of Taekwondo history?

Recently, have searched the history section of the Kukkiwon and WTF and do not see one reference to the individual kwans and there founders that came together to create the magnificent organizations they now run.
(If I have over looked anything please point me in the proper direction)

How are cave drawings from thousands of years ago be prioritized above the founding fathers? If this is the case then we should all right Kukkiwon and WTF and demand that the neanderthal man be credited with creating Taekwondo which would then make Taekwondo an African martial art!

Sound ignorant? I agree....so why has this integral part of Taekwondo history been removed?

Regards,
Spookey

Especially when those 'cave drawings', sculpted figures and so on are now know to have been widespread across both Eastern and Southern Asia from *way* earlier periods, being essentially indistinguishable from guardian figures in Western China, Southern India and all points in between (for excruciatingly detailed documentation of these points, see

Burdick, Dakin. 1997. 'People and events of Taekwondo's formative years'. Journal of Asian Martial Arts.

Burdick, Dakin. 2000. 'People and events of Taekwondo's formative years'. [expanded version of the 1997 JAMA article], available at http://www.budosportcapelle.nl/gesch.html

among other sources. See also

Madis, Eric. 2003. 'The evolution of Taekwondo from Japanese Karate'. In Martial Arts in the Modern World, ed. by Thomas Green, Prager Publishing.

for further discussion and corroboration. Burdick discusses the specific abuses of history that the ROK's TKD directorate has happily committed in its efforts to portrey TKD as going back into prehistory, with particular emphasis on the the KKW's absolutely crackpot invocation of the cave art and scultural figures you're alluding to; the hysterical thing is that one of my Hapkido textbooks, Hapkido by Gm. Hui Son Choy, 7th dan, claims exactly the same Three Kingdoms era cave paintings and sculpture as evidence for the prehistoric antiquity of... yes, you guessed it... Hapkido!!. :lfao:

tellner

01-10-2009, 06:36 PM

It's been posted before, but it bears reposting.

Daniel Sullivan

01-10-2009, 07:01 PM

Sound ignorant? I agree....so why has this integral part of Taekwondo history been removed?
Perhaps because another integral part of taekwondo history is Shotokan roots. Since Shotokan is Japanese, it cannot be allowed to have any part in Taekwondo history. And so, Taekwondo is now thousands of years old. Acknowledgement of the founders means acknowledgement that Taekwondo is recent and came from somewhere. And since a good number of the founders, including Gen. Choi, had Shotokan backgrounds, their acknowledgement opens the door to acknowledgement of some connection to Shotokan.

Make no mistake: they do not want Taekwondo to be linked to Karate in any way, shape or form. And if a fabricated history is what it takes, then that is what they'll do. Think about this: fifty years down the road, there will be nobody living who will have any memory of the events that led up to the creation of Taekwondo or the early years of the art. By then, it will simply be accepted by and large (they hope) that Taekwondo is an ancient art. How they'll connect WTF sparring to an ancient art is beyond me, but I'm sure that they'll think of something.

This is very sad, in my opinion. We are a part of a martial art that is less than a century old. In less than a century, Taekwondo has developed a well established martial sport, become a very effective SD art, and become the most popular MA worldwide. We are in the position to collectively shape the very first century of that art. 'We' includes the KKW. This is a golden opportunity that is being squandered in favor of fabricated nonsense that sounds just like any one of a dozen established martial arts.

Daniel

chrispillertkd

01-10-2009, 07:03 PM

Dear All,

I pose a question...does anyone see the Republic of Korea (Kukkiwon, WTF, & KTA) removing crucial portions of Taekwondo history?

Recently, have searched the history section of the Kukkiwon and WTF and do not see one reference to the individual kwans and there founders that came together to create the magnificent organizations they now run.
(If I have over looked anything please point me in the proper direction)

Someone already posted a link to Dakin Burdick's article (which I found to be good, but not great). There is also a translation of parts of The Modern History of Taekwondo[i] available at www.martialartsresource.com (http://www.martialartsresource.com) (check for the lonk on the Korean side of the site). This is a work written by Koreans and which traces the development of the Kwans and the KTA, ITF (very briefly) and WTF. It is hailed by some but, IMNSHO as someone in academia, would be well served by extensive footnoting.

Lastly, there is Dr. He-Yong Kimm's upcoming book on the history of Taekwon-Do. No release date yet, as far as I know, however. I think sometime later this year.

How are cave drawings from thousands of years ago be prioritized above the founding fathers? If this is the case then we should all right Kukkiwon and WTF and demand that the [I]neanderthal man be credited with creating Taekwondo which would then make Taekwondo an African martial art!

Sound ignorant? I agree....so why has this integral part of Taekwondo history been removed?

Regards,
Spookey

Well, form what I understand things are gradually changing in Korea. A few years ago the monument Gen. Choi made on Cheju Island, where the 29th Infantry Division and, thus, the Oh Do Kwan was headquartered, was restored. You can see pics of it on the web if you do a little looking, I'm sure. Also, the ITF has been more visible in South Korea recently with Gen. Choi's son returning to the ROK for at least a few visits this past year as well as the ITF participating in some big tournament there last year.

These things, it seems to me, indicate at least a growing awareness of the Kwan-based past of Taekwon-Do and a willingness to see more than simply the Kukkiwon's version of things.

Pax,

Chris

exile

01-10-2009, 07:04 PM

It's been posted before, but it bears reposting.

Yes—it's very easy to forget. And large organizations pushing particular agendas tend to rely on the willingness of individuals to be lulled into a kind of stupor by the endless repetition of whatever fabrications serve the interest of that organization.

Here's what I don't get. Don't people get offended by having these large Korean international orgs trying to get them swallow stuff that any competent graduate student in an Asian archæology program could tear into itty-bitty shreds on the basis of 15 or 20 minutes' library work? Doesn't that kind of intellectual disingenuousness call for some kind of harsh response, especially from e.g. North Americans, who have no particular stake in retailing historical distortions and legends that are self-serving only for the Korean government? Why do people who have access to the ample historical and archæological information that shows what rubbish these claims consist of actually find such behavior acceptable? This is something that for the life of me I don't understand.

PS Chris, you indicate you have some reservations about Burdick's stuff—where specifically do you think it could have been improved?

StuartA

01-10-2009, 07:16 PM

Sadly, the WTF has done this since it was formed in 73. It took out Gen Choi and what he achieved altogethor and has perpertrated the myths ever since.. especially the 2000 year one.

However, internet, books etc are changing things and revealing the truth and a Dr Kimm (noted Korean historian) is on the verge of releasing his books well + better relations with the ITF now than before.. so things are changing and I suggest the WTF change with it or look worse than they do already regarding the historics of TKD!

Stuart

StuartA

01-10-2009, 07:18 PM

Here's what I don't get. Don't people get offended by having these large Korean international orgs trying to get them swallow stuff that any competent graduate student in an Asian archæology program could tear into itty-bitty shreds on the basis of 15 or 20 minutes' library work?
I get (mildy) offended by any org telling me BS! I prefer the truth, no matter what it is! Yet.. many orgs (big and small) still try to BS their people despite the wealth of evidence that is outb there that can make them look silly indeed.. go figure!

Stuart

IcemanSK

01-10-2009, 07:54 PM

The reason for the 2000 year old story is to enhance the Korean national MA story. But, as others have said, from a non-Korean's P.O.V. the real story has a rich enough history by itself.

Chung Do Kwan's own story begins with Lee, Won Kuk learning from no less than Gichin Funakoshi. It's not like he trained under Bill & Ted Funakoshi & we just say he trained under Gichin.....He really did!

The 8 other Kwans that were united all have similar rich stories.

I think the story that the Koreans "took what they learned from the Japanese & made it their own, & took it around the world" is a better story for Korean national pride. Proven in combat in Vietnam alone should be proof that it works. And the best part is, It's true!

The real history I can explain to a ten year old American kid in 5-10 minutes with pride. The "official one" I can never keep straight for myself. I'm not gonna tell it to a 10 year old.

terryl965

01-10-2009, 08:12 PM

What has this rotten can of worms been brought back to life, we all know everything the Koreans say id the Gospal go a head and ask them, they will tell you that.

arnisador

01-10-2009, 08:41 PM

Don't people get offended by having these large Korean international orgs trying to get them swallow stuff that any competent graduate student in an Asian archæology program could tear into itty-bitty shreds on the basis of 15 or 20 minutes' library work?

Study Okinawan Karate and you'll be told that it was used to repel sword-wielding samurai by the brave but weaponless Ryukyuan resistance. Study Muay Thai (from Thailand) or Muay Boran (from Cambodia) and you'll be told the one you're studying is the first and the other is a pale imitation. (I leave aside Lethwei from Myanmar, Pradal Serey from Cambodia, Muay Laos from Laos, and other claimants) I am reliably informed that the cause of the Japanese losing control of the Philippines by the end of WWII was the guerrilla warfare of machete-wielding FMAers. Then there's the Japanese denial of Chinese influences.

So, in answer to yoru question: Yeah, but...

Miles

01-10-2009, 09:23 PM

exile

01-10-2009, 10:18 PM

My take on history is that it doesn't really matter. It doesn't make my punches any stronger or my kicks any harder. Does a basketball player need to know history to be a better player? Does a painter need to know history to be a better painter?

Actually, yes. At least Michaelangelo, the Impressionists and Picasso thought so. They were all passionate students of previous work; in order to understand the context in which they were first exposed to the art of their immediate predecessors, they investigated several centuries of previous art to see just what kinds of problems their distant ancestors had solved. For that matter, Renaissance theories of perspective were deeply indebted to the achievements of the ancient Greek mathematicians whose work was largely unknown during the Middle Ages, but was rediscovered in Arabic translations that the Italian humanists encountered. Those insights into how line, size and the illusion of distance paved the way for the great art of the 14th century and after. The same happened over successive generations in music (e.g., Bach was one of the foremost students of the late Italian Renaissance composer Frescobaldi, a major influence on his thinking about the balance between melody and counterpoint), calligraphy and manuscript illumination, and a host of other disciplines. It's probably true that the Renaissance, in spite of its name, was intellectually founded on the recovery of lost knowledge and its subsequent development.

This has happened repeatedly in the history of art, science and mathematics. History is the living laboratory of what people have tried in the past, what it was they found that worked, and what they found that didn't work. We ignore it at our peril.

Daniel Sullivan

01-10-2009, 10:25 PM

Yes—it's very easy to forget. And large organizations pushing particular agendas tend to rely on the willingness of individuals to be lulled into a kind of stupor by the endless repetition of whatever fabrications serve the interest of that organization.

Here's what I don't get. Don't people get offended by having these large Korean international orgs trying to get them swallow stuff that any competent graduate student in an Asian archæology program could tear into itty-bitty shreds on the basis of 15 or 20 minutes' library work? Doesn't that kind of intellectual disingenuousness call for some kind of harsh response, especially from e.g. North Americans, who have no particular stake in retailing historical distortions and legends that are self-serving only for the Korean government? Why do people who have access to the ample historical and archæological information that shows what rubbish these claims consist of actually find such behavior acceptable? This is something that for the life of me I don't understand.
The answer to the bolded question is a pretty sad one: People either figure it out, get disgusted and simply exit either the kukkiwon or taekwondo altogether, or they buy into it simply because they want to or are too lazy not to, or stand to gain commercially from perpetuating it.

Even the American Taekwondo Association perpetuates this. Here is an exerpt from the "Brief history" of taekwondo on their website:

Although its roots can be somewhat traced back to ancient Korea, it is a historic fact that Taekwondo as an organized art is relatively modern. In fact, the only documented history begins in the mid 1900's.b.k

The actual beginnings of Taekwondo are obscured by time, yet many historians believe it originated from a Korean martial arts form known as t'aekyon practiced over 1,300 years ago.

Now, I'm not picking on the ATA. Nearly every taekwondo school of every org or even independent schools websites read something similar. In fact, the ATA's is actually the closest to acknowledging that TKD is a completely modern art, then going on to regurgitate the ancient history stuff, keeping themselves blameless by invoking "many historians believe..."

Anyway, I picked the ATA because they are specifically called, 'AMERICAN' and really have made such a complete break with the rest of the large orgs that they have no real reason to perpetuate such things. As I said, that first paragraph is the only of its type that I've personally seen on anyone's website that has a history page.

I give the ATA credit for having the guts to do that much. They do go on to provide a brief and very, very general account from TKD's inception through the fifties, then go on to talk about some of the art's generalities, all of which is fine, and they even mention the Kwans (How the KKW miss that but the ATA didn't, I'll never know) but they wrap up with some ancient looking carving of two people in a stance that looks decidedly unlike any taekwondo I've ever seen, a clear attempt to invoke an ancient history of TKD that doesn't exist. I don't fault them; everyone else does. But still.

To be honest, if the KKW gave the exact same description as this on their website, I'd give them more credit. The ATA catches a lot of heat on most forums, so I find it rather humorous that their website has a more honest view of TKD history than most others I've seen. But even they couldn't resist some 2000 year old connection with Taekyeon while simultaneously avoiding any mention of Shotokan influence.

I'll end here my rather rambling post.

Daniel

tellner

01-10-2009, 10:43 PM

My take on history is that it doesn't really matter. It doesn't make my punches any stronger or my kicks any harder. Does a basketball player need to know history to be a better player? Does a painter need to know history to be a better painter?
A nice sentiment, no doubt. But you're saying that you'll swallow lies willingly. It's too much trouble to say "But see! The Emperor isn't wearing any clothes!" Convenience is nice. But so is personal integrity. And if you start excusing lies in the little insignificant things like martial arts you'll excuse them in the important ones.

The Chinese took information from an Indian Buddhist monk and made it their own. The Okinawans took information from the Chinese and made it their own. The Japanese took information from the Okinawans and made it their own. My senior Glenn U. convincingly argues that the Koreans took information from the Okinawans (i.e. not Japanese) and made it their own.

Except that none of these is actually true. Da-Mo did not bring the martial arts to China. In fact, he may never have actually existed. Okinawan boxing was influenced by China, but the stories about Okinawans peering through fences and stealing the Chinese secrets are not true. Your "senior" is wrong. The Koreans did not learn their Karate from Okinawa. The records of where they studied in Japan and from Japanese teachers are still there for anyone to see.

Once you start believing lies because it's convenient you will believe any number of them

exile

01-10-2009, 11:06 PM

Except that none of these is actually true. Da-Mo did not bring the martial arts to China. In fact, he may never have actually existed.

For devastating corroboration of Tellner's comments here, you might want to check out the article by Stan Henning—one of the genuinely great MA historians—in Classical Fighting Arts 12 (#35), 'The imaginary world of Buddhism and East Asian martial arts', pp. 37–41. As he points out, and documents in excruciating detail, 'the myth surrounding Boddhidharma and Shaolin martial arts first appeared... between 1904 and 1907', in a popular novel by Liu Tieyun called Travels of Laocan. It has no historical basis whatever, and actually shows up in Japan no earlier than the 1920s, as Henning notes, 'in time to be pressed, along with Zen Buddhism, into the service of the rising tide of nationalism and militarism during the 1930s'. The fact that so many people are so willing to swallow, sight unseen, fantasy stories like this, and never question their bona fides, is another illustration of the widespread lack of critical skepticism that the ROK seeks to exploit through its instrumentalities such as the KKW and the WTF.

The Koreans did not learn their Karate from Okinawa. The records of where they studied in Japan and from Japanese teachers are still there for anyone to see.

True again. You can see this in something as simple as the order of the Pyung-Ahn hyungs, named after the Pinan's, all right, but look at the first two in both TKD and TSD and you'll see that Pyung Ahn Ii Dan, the second Pyung Ahn hyung, with that notorious opening 'double block', is actually not Pinan Nidan, the second Okinawan Pinan kata, but rather Pinan Shodan, the first of the Okinawan kata in this set! It is, however, Heian Nidan, the second in the Japanese version, because the order was reversed in the transition from Okinawan karate to Shotokan. In other words, the order of the Pyung Ahn hyungs reflects the Japanese order of the kata, not the Okinawan... exactly what you'd expect, given where it was that the Kwan founders learned those katas. So far as I know, not one of the Kwan founders studied in Okinawa; rather, they studied with Okinwan expats in Japan, where the Okinawan material had already been substantially changed, and diluted.

Once you start believing lies because it's convenient you will believe any number of them

And that's why it really is important to study history. Time may make fools of us all, but there's no reason why we should let our fellow mortals to the same thing to us...

Twin Fist

01-10-2009, 11:10 PM

this subject is why i wont have anything to do with Korean Orgs, why I feel bad for anyone that HAS to deal with them and while i look down on those that CHOOSES to have anything to do with them

arnisador

01-11-2009, 12:12 AM

this subject is why i wont have anything to do with Korean Orgs, why I feel bad for anyone that HAS to deal with them and while i look down on those that CHOOSES to have anything to do with them

This myth-making drives me crazy too, but I wouldn't go that far. A strict no-BS rule will rule out a lot of martial arts. Many of these instructors are just uncritically passing on what was told to them.

Daniel Sullivan

01-11-2009, 01:39 AM

this subject is why i wont have anything to do with Korean Orgs, why I feel bad for anyone that HAS to deal with them and while i look down on those that CHOOSES to have anything to do with them
I can see the first two sentiments, though I question if anyone really and truely has to deal with the Korean Orgs. Regarding the last one, there are those who choose to be involved with them because they either feel that they should be with a Korean art, or because they hold ranking in one of them and simply have chosen to remain a part of it.

To an extent, I choose to be involved with the KKW. I certainly could have turned down testing for first dan on that basis. But I chose to simply because for me, it was silly not to. For one, I consider it administratively advantageous to me; I can direct someone to a website in Korean to verify a credential. The school that I have chosen to remain a part of is KKW, and aside from making use of the forms and WTF sparring rules, the KKW really has no effect on how GM Kim runs his classes. The KKW material gets worked in along with a good amount of practical SD, and I don't have to rely on revisionist history simply because I feel that the KKW is administratively beneficial to me.

As I said, I don't believe that anyone ultimately has to deal with the Korean orgs, or any other for that matter. I do believe that a good number simply feel that choosing one is the best course of action for them.:)

Daniel

Makalakumu

01-11-2009, 03:15 AM

My take on history is that it doesn't really matter.

I disagree Miles. Eventually, a student comes to the point where you need to really see into the mind of your teacher. You've got to understand where the material you are learning comes from in order to build a similar understanding for yourself.

This understanding absolutely essential to building a better level of skill because it guides your advanced training.

The problem with changing the history to fit the current national mood is that eventually the taekwondoin runs into neat little walls that limit what you can actually do and how much skill you can actually attain. If you claim that your art is descended from the ferocious "Hwarang" and that these warriors fought effectively against all kinds of forces and all you can do with high level skills is throw really sweet looking jumpy kicky crap, then you will see what I'm talking about.

Contrast this with the Japanese Samurai arts that actually trace a history back to a time when actual fighting skill was a matter of life or death. If what the Hwarang did was so damned deadly, we'd see others doing it.

I'd like to see a regiment of the jumpy flippy guys go up against a regiment of trained warriors. It'd put that damned lie to bed real quick.

Of course this line of reasoning is ridiculous because everyone knows what TKD actually is. It's a modern combat sport, like boxing, but with the feet. Yet, these blatent lies about the history persist and waste a lot of a students time that could be spent getting better in the ring. And they also pass on load of false confidence that the art could actually be used outside of the TKD ring.

It's a perfect recipe for an ass beating or worse.

The bottom line is that the history really does matter. If you don't understand where the art came from, then you aren't going to understand the context to which the art applies. If you don't understand the context to which the art applies, then you start to really think that the best counter to a punch is a 540 jump spinning back kick.

I'd wager to say that all of the fudging with history in the MA in general is why we see a great majority of the weird stuff we see.

exile

01-11-2009, 01:49 PM

You've got to understand where the material you are learning comes from in order to build a similar understanding for yourself.

...

This understanding absolutely essential to building a better level of skill because it guides your advanced training.

...

The problem with changing the history to fit the current national mood is that eventually the taekwondoin runs into neat little walls that limit what you can actually do and how much skill you can actually attain...

The bottom line is that the history really does matter.

Quoted for truth. I'd like to take the same ideas that maunakumu has put forth and apply them now from the other direction: not so much what you'll get wrong if you don't get the history right, but what you could be getting if you did get the history right.

Virtually all of the current or previous TKD hyungs to Shodan, from the kichos (simply duplicates of the Shotokan Taikyoku katas that are at least as old as Gichin Funakoshi's Shotokan classes in Japan, or his son's, and possibly a good deal earlier, from the Itosu era) and the Pyung Ahns in schools that still do them (identical, move for move, to the Japanese Heian series, which are identical to the Okinawan Pinans but with the order of the first two reversed, as per an earlier post) through the Palgwes and the Taegeuks, are either (i) literal replications of Okinawan/Japanese forms, or (ii) novel combinations of subsequences which are literal replications of subsequences from Okinawan/Japanese forms (in many cases, identifiable as one of the Pinan/Heian series). There is a huge amount of research that's been done on bunkai for these forms, and some novel photographic evidence bearing on that research; thus, Gennosuke Higake in his recent book Hidden Karate: the True Bunkai for the Heian Katas and Naihanchi, displays a photograph on the very cover of the book of Funakoshi in decidedly combat-style sparring with Hironori Otsuka, the founder of Wado-ryu karate. You can see precisely the so called 'double-block' move from Pinan Shodan/Heian Nidan used with the rising block deflecting a straight punch from Otsuka and the 'inside outward block' actually applied as a strike to the jaw/throat region. And it was serious business: Otsuko's head is clearly being struck or jerked backwards either as a result of the strike or a desperate effort to get out of its way. The standard bunkai for this move, as Iain Abernethy has discussed at length, looks nothing like this, but instead involves a very complex and impractical use that assumes pretty much complete compliance from the attacker. Not bloody likely, eh?!

The payoff for the student of TKD who recognizes the origins of TKD in Japanese karate is that it gives you, for free, a combat-applicable entrée into the bunkai for Palgwe Sa Jang, whose first six moves are identical to the first six in Heian Nidan, the very one that Higake shows Funakoshi applying to something very close to a real fighting situation. And there are dozens of other cases where streetwise applications of movement sequences from Shotokan or other kata forms, reflecting responses to the realities of violent combat situations regardless of the particular style of MA you're applying, can be lifted 'off the shelf' and added to your SD arsenal. It's just common sense to minimize the amount of effort you have to spend reinventing the wheel, eh? And considerations of rationality would suggest that if history-smart practical MAists have been able, from a mixture of research on karate's past and savvy reverse engineering, to unearth effective and damaging applications of kata, then TKDists and TSDists, whose forms overwhelmingly originate in those kata, can profit in a major way from those insights. But if you have the idea that the KMAs arose out of thousands of years of isolated development from the ancient heroic Three Kingdoms soil, then you're hardly likely to see much relevance in the enormous productive work that's already come out of the 'bunkai-jutsu' framework amongst contemporary karateka. Which would definitely be your loss!

Here's a parallel: one of the things that modern calligraphers, typesetters and book designers were long impressed with was the perfection of appearance of pages in Mediæval manuscripts, regardless of the dimensions of the book in question. How did the ancient scribes know exactly where to set out the blocks of texts that they produced in their scriptoria? It was a complete mystery, until in the 1950s and 60s the Dutch type designer and scribe Jan Tschichold, on the basis of a long period of historical research and experimentation, derived a canon—a mechanical graphic procedure—that would allow you, for any double-page book opening, to draw a series of pencil lines, drop certain perpendiculars, and on the basis of those pencil lines identify exactly where the writing blocks should be set—a simple trick (once you knew how it worked, as always) which had been standard knowledge in the Middle Ages. This (re)discovery in effect revolutionized modern book design... and it grew directly from his immersion in the history of his art. There's plenty of real wisdom and knowledge back there, gained from generations of 'shop practice', if we're willing to look carefully and critically for it, and not accept fantasy substitutes.

terryl965

01-11-2009, 03:38 PM

History is just that History, those that will not accept it will be doomed for life, those that will embrace it will be part of life. Those that just do not give a damm are the ones that have no worries in there life.

Miles

01-11-2009, 03:50 PM

A nice sentiment, no doubt. But you're saying that you'll swallow lies willingly. It's too much trouble to say "But see! The Emperor isn't wearing any clothes!" Convenience is nice. But so is personal integrity. And if you start excusing lies in the little insignificant things like martial arts you'll excuse them in the important ones.

I neither appreciate you putting words in my mouth nor the shot at my personal integrity.

I never said I'd swallow lies, willingly or unwillingly. I'm willing to keep an open mind.

I enjoy these history threads, heck, I enjoy learning history. What I did say is that it makes no difference to my practice, today, in 2009, whether TKD comes from Korea, Japan, Okinawa, Mongolia, or from Vulcan. I enjoy training for training's sake.

Except that none of these is actually true. Da-Mo did not bring the martial arts to China. In fact, he may never have actually existed. Okinawan boxing was influenced by China, but the stories about Okinawans peering through fences and stealing the Chinese secrets are not true. Your "senior" is wrong. The Koreans did not learn their Karate from Okinawa. The records of where they studied in Japan and from Japanese teachers are still there for anyone to see.

Da Mo/Boddidharma-Classical Fighting Arts Issue#4, Cameron Logman's Article entitled, "Warrior Arts of India" (pg 53, Par #4): "Much has been written about India's influence over the Chinese martial arts. Some of it is true and some is unfounded. For instance, there is no scholarly consensus that Bodhidharma introduced Indian martial arts to China. The list of travelers from India to China is not limited to Bodhidharma, but includes a wide variety of merchants and numerous Buddhist scholars such as Ajitasena, Amoghavajra, Bodhivardhana and Buddhapala. If India has had a direct influence on Chinese martial arts, it would be historically inaccurate to place that burden only on a single traveler such as Bodhidharma. Still, it is indisputable that Indian influence on China has been enormous."

If it wasn't Bodhidharma, maybe it was someone else.

I never said anything about Okinawans peering through fences. Okinawan goju-ryu grandmaster Morio Higaonna wrote an entire chapter (#2) in his book, "The History of Karate" on Kanryo Higaonna, an Okinawan who spent 15 years studying Chinese martial arts in China.

Mark Bishop, in his book, “Okinawan Karate-Teachers, Styles and Secret Techniques” states that Norisato Nakaima studied Chinese boxing and weaponry in China (page 19). Bishop mentions on page 27 that Chojun Miyagi tried to trace the steps of his teacher, Kanryo Higaonna and along with Gokenki (a Chinese man living in Okinawa) went to Fuchou, China and trained for approximately one year. Finally, Bishop tells of Kanbun Uechi who also studied Chinese boxing in Fuchou before returning to Okinawa where he taught Pangain-noon now popularly stylized as Uechi-ryu.

Harry Cook in his book, "The Precise History of Shotokan", page 2 states that "Chinese (Ming Dynasty) envoys arrived in Okinawa in 1372. I would think that the Okinawans, over the next say 500 years, would have had enough exposure to Chinese influences of all sorts to include learning martial arts.

As far as Koreans learning from Japanese-that is just silly semantics. Funakoshi was Okinawan. Mabuni was Okinawan. Kanken Toyama was Okinawan.Yes, Koreans learned karate in Japan, but the founders of several Kwans, notably Lee, Won Kuk, Chun, Sang Sup, and Yoon, Byung In learned alongside their Japanese colleagues. They were learning an Okinawan martial art before their colleagues turned it into something uniquely Japanese. They returned to Korea and taught what they learned. If you want a reference, check out:
http://kimsookarate.com/intro/history.html
These founder's students created something uniquely Korean.

Exile, I appreciate your erudite post. I can study art, mathematics, and physics. Nevertheless, I still can't draw a straight line, do calculus, or figure out Einstein's theory. But, I can move my 3rd dan 300lb student when he's holding a kicking shield. So I guess I've learned a little something over the past 34 years. Apparently even someone without integrity can throw a punch or kick.

Makalakumu

01-11-2009, 04:14 PM

Apparently even someone without integrity can throw a punch or kick.

I wouldn't say that, Miles. I've met you and I know you're a good guy. This discussion isn't personal, but it's easy to take some of the broad characterizations personally. Everyone has different ways that they practice, but they also have many stark similarities. I think the best thing to do in this situation is read the post for what it is and check out what you do in relation to the post.

That said, I have no doubt that you can blast the hell out of someone with a kick. All other people are trying to say is that there is more to the art. The disconnect between the true history and the current formation of the art is an impediment for a modern practicioner to see this. Fortuneately, you've got people like Master Penfil that can open your mind to a certain extent. You know, from the seminar that we both attended that there is more to the art.

Therefore, I would emphatically state that the history is important. Not only to make sense out of the current state of TKD curriculum, but also as a road map to revamping it into something new. And I can see this going both ways. A sport TKD practicioner could practice TKD and be a lot more effective if it was trained more like boxing. In fact, I think if it was taught like that, you probably clean the clock of someone who spend a lot of time doing poomse and other things.

On the other hand, if you insist on practicing hyung and other non-sparring related elements, you are going to be left with a mixed and matched system where the elements bear little relationship to one another. A teaching method will not exist like this forever because there is no philosophic depth. This kind of TKD has to change or it will die out.

Miles, I'm writing a book on exactly that. I train in TSD but there is still enough similarity for it to apply to "traditional" TKD. When you take the history into account what does this do for a teaching curriculum? This is the fundamental premise of my book.

exile

01-11-2009, 04:15 PM

As far as Koreans learning from Japanese-that is just silly semantics. Funakoshi was Okinawan. Mabuni was Okinawan. Kanken Toyama was Okinawan.Yes, Koreans learned karate in Japan, but the founders of several Kwans, notably Lee, Won Kuk, Chun, Sang Sup, and Yoon, Byung In learned alongside their Japanese colleagues. They were learning an Okinawan martial art before their colleagues turned it into something uniquely Japanese. They returned to Korea and taught what they learned. If you want a reference, check out:
http://kimsookarate.com/intro/history.html
These founder's students created something uniquely Korean.

Miles, I don't think the semantic difference here is at all trivial.

From the moment he arrived in Japan, Funakoshi was busy repackaging karate for mass consumption; the training he was providing in his university classes was fundamentally different from what he himself received in Okinawa. When GF learned karate from Itosu and others, his primary training was in the performance, study and application of kata, particularly Naihanchi; on some accounts, his primary training consisted of close to a decade of focused study of a very small number of kata, and unravelling the deepest applications he find of the techs there. Apparently, Motobu thought he hadn't gotten nearly close enough to the really deep bunkai for Naihanchi, and says so in one of his books in so many words—there was no love lost between them—but the point is that that's what Okinawan-style training in karate consisted in. That's how Itosu learned from Matsumura, how Motobu and others learned—along of course with fairly brutal sparring and challenge matches.

In Japan, all of that changed. Study of bunkai was minimal, in no small part because, as Higaki and others report, there was a kind of gentleman's agreement amongst the Okinawan expatriates not to supply the 'oral explanations', i.e., the true bunkai, for the kata—which gradually came to be far more about passing rank tests than anything to do with CQ combat—to the Japanese students. The emphasis was on kihon techs, line drills and progressively less realistic sport sparring, and things continued that way into the 30s, when the Kwan founders and other Korean MAists came to Japan to study. They were not learning the art as practiced and taught in Okinawa; they were getting the karate that Funakoshi had undertaken to the Japanese Defense and Education ministries to teach, whose intent was instilling group spirit and obedience for the most part to young men who would soon be joining the Japanese military. Unlike what happened in the Korean War era ROK, hand-to-hand combat was not the primary purpose, or of great interest, to the Japanese military; reflexive action, obedience and fitness was. If you want more details on this, check out the following (http://www.24fightingchickens.com/2006/01/29/funakoshi-man-vs-myth/) by Rob Redmond, who probably knows as much about Funakoshi's pre-war career as anyone (though he mises some tricks here), or even better, Gennosuke Higaki's book, which is linked to GF's teaching through his own master, Shozan Kubota. The primary difference seems to have been the small-scale, far more SD-oriented training that the Okinawans practiced, and that our own member Kwan Jang, who has studied the Okinawan version close-up, has written about in a number of posts.

So the Kwan founders didn't get karate anything like what was still being taught in Okinawa. They got the diluted, reduced version that Funakoshi quite consciously provided to his large classes, with minimal personal supervision or introduction to the combat techs inherent in the forms. That's a big difference from what was being taught on the Ryukyu Islands at the same time.

Miles

01-11-2009, 04:36 PM

I disagree Miles. Eventually, a student comes to the point where you need to really see into the mind of your teacher. You've got to understand where the material you are learning comes from in order to build a similar understanding for yourself.

I can appreciate this John. At this point in my training, my teacher (a career US Army Combatives Instructor, retired) and I are of the same mind.

Yet, these blatent lies about the history persist and waste a lot of a students time that could be spent getting better in the ring. And they also pass on load of false confidence that the art could actually be used outside of the TKD ring.

This is where I am coming from-let's spend more time training.

The bottom line is that the history really does matter. If you don't understand where the art came from, then you aren't going to understand the context to which the art applies.

(My advance apologies for what is going to be severe thread drift!!!)

But if the context has changed (i.e. we are not in 1850 Okinawa or even 1945 Post-WWI Korea but in 2009 USA/Europe), then the art must change, right?

So why are so many folks locked into learning applications for 1850 Okinawa? If you are training in the martial arts for self-defense, don't you think the student's time is better served practicing and discovering responses to today's habitual acts of violence?

In that case, why not get info from the FBI as to the most common street crimes and practice responses? Wouldn't that be much more efficient than trying to figure out boonhae from the Korean interpretation of an Okinawan kata? In fact, why bother with a martial art at all-just get a weapon.

I don't train for solely for self-defense. However, I do believe that full-contact sparring, even with rules of no punching to the face, is better training for self-defense than drills with a compliant partner. In my opinion, facing someone trying to knock me out while I try to knock him out, even within a restricted rule-set, is self-defense related.

exile

01-11-2009, 04:58 PM

So why are so many folks locked into learning applications for 1850 Okinawa? If you are training in the martial arts for self-defense, don't you think the student's time is better served practicing and discovering responses to today's habitual acts of violence?

Except that the techs that people such as Burgar, Abernethy, Clark, McCarthy for Karate and StuartA and SJON (Simon O'Neil) for TKD have recovered from both KKW and ITF hyungs appear to be totally realistic in the context of the late 20th/early 21st century urban world. The conclusion that seems most reasonable is that these habitual acts of violence—the typical violence initiators—have not changed at all. Grabs, shoves and other attack startups, the kind of thing that there are layers and layers of defenses for built into the katas (and the derivative hyungs of the KMAs), still represent the statistically commonest initiators of street violence. More on sources shortly...

In that case, why not get info from the FBI as to the most common street crimes and practice responses? Wouldn't that be much more efficient than trying to figure out boonhae from the Korean interpretation of an Okinawan kata?

That's exactly the kind of place that people like Patrick McCarthy, Bill Burgar (Five Years, One Kata) and J.W. Titchen (Heian Flow System) have appealed to in framing the applications they offer for various kata. Titchen in his book spends close to 40 pages reviewing statistical data from the US Justice Department and FBI and the British Home Office, with massive documentation from a library's worth of official reports, on the numerically typical kinds of assaults that are carried out both with weapons and without. And his conclusions, like that of the others experts who have undertaken quantitative studies of HAOVs along with bunkai applications, is that the applications retrievable from karate kata, using fairly straightforward 'decoding' principles of kata interpretation, exactly meet the particular HAOVs revealed by statistical analyses. The katas involved in many cases go well back deep into the 19th century, as you point out. So it seems most reasonable to conclude that things in the way of street violence haven't changed much since then. Face to face, there are only certain ways to initiate an attack on someone, and probably most of them had already been discovered by by 1850!

In fact, why bother with a martial art at all-just get a weapon.

It's not either/or. But empty-hand training is exactly what you need when confronted with a rapidly developing attack at very close range—if only to give you time to produce a weapon, in case you think it necessary.

I don't train for solely for self-defense. However, I do believe that full-contact sparring, even with rules of no punching to the face, is better training for self-defense than drills with a compliant partner.

Drills with a compliant partner are a good way to start, to get the sense of the technique down, as long as you progressively move to non-compliant training that increasingly simulates a violent street attack by someone seeking to do critical damage to you. After all, that's what training for the worst case is all about.

MBuzzy

01-11-2009, 05:00 PM

Miles, I don't think the semantic difference here is at all trivial.

From the moment he arrived in Japan, Funakoshi was busy repackaging karate for mass consumption; the training he was providing in his university classes was fundamentally different from what he himself received in Okinawa. When GF learned karate from Itosu and others, his primary training was in the performance, study and application of kata, particularly Naihanchi; on some accounts, his primary training consisted of close to a decade of focused study of a very small number of kata, and unravelling the deepest applications he find of the techs there. Apparently, Motobu thought he hadn't gotten nearly close enough to the really deep bunkai for Naihanchi, and says so in one of his books in so many words—there was no love lost between them—but the point is that that's what Okinawan-style training in karate consisted in. That's how Itosu learned from Matsumura, how Motobu and others learned—along of course with fairly brutal sparring and challenge matches.

In Japan, all of that changed. Study of bunkai was minimal, in no small part because, as Higaki and others report, there was a kind of gentleman's agreement amongst the Okinawan expatriates not to supply the 'oral explanations', i.e., the true bunkai, for the kata—which gradually came to be far more about passing rank tests than anything to do with CQ combat—to the Japanese students. The emphasis was on kihon techs, line drills and progressively less realistic sport sparring, and things continued that way into the 30s, when the Kwan founders and other Korean MAists came to Japan to study. They were not learning the art as practiced and taught in Okinawa; they were getting the karate that Funakoshi had undertaken to the Japanese Defense and Education ministries to teach, who intent was instilling group spirit and obedience for the most part to young men who would soon be joining the Japanese military. Unlike what happened in the Korean War era ROK, hand-to-hand combat was not the primary purpose, or of great interest, to the Japanese military; reflexive action, obedience and fitness was. If you want more details on this, check out the following (http://www.24fightingchickens.com/2006/01/29/funakoshi-man-vs-myth/) by Rob Redmond, who probably knows as much about Funakoshi's pre-war career as anyone (though he mises some tricks here), or even better, Gennosuke Higaki's book, which is linked to GF's teaching through his own master, Shozan Kubota. The primary different seems to have been the small-scale, far more SD-oriented training that the Okinawans practiced, and that our own member Kwan Jang, who has studied the Okinawan version close-up, has written about in a number of posts.

So the Kwan founders didn't get karate anything like what was still being taught in Okinawa. They got the diluted, reduced version that Funakoshi quite consciously provided to his large classes, with minimal personal supervision or introduction to the combat techs inherent in the forms. That's a big difference from what was being taught on the Ryukyu Islands at the same time.

Combine all of this with a very deeply rooted Korean culture (Asian in general to some extent) of the truth being "the story that is most widely accepted" and you have a very difficult problem. As Americans, we seek truth and the accurate history. Part of this is cultural. In Korea, if the grandmaster of an organization says "this is how it happened," that will generally be accepted without question. It is simply a matter of culture and respect. Even now, it is considered extremely rude to ever question an elder or doubt his or her account.

Makalakumu

01-11-2009, 06:05 PM

Combine all of this with a very deeply rooted Korean culture (Asian in general to some extent) of the truth being "the story that is most widely accepted" and you have a very difficult problem. As Americans, we seek truth and the accurate history. Part of this is cultural. In Korea, if the grandmaster of an organization says "this is how it happened," that will generally be accepted without question. It is simply a matter of culture and respect. Even now, it is considered extremely rude to ever question an elder or doubt his or her account.

Craig, is this an aspect of Korean culture or is it an aspect of the particular cultural block stretching from China over Korea to Japan? I would guess at the latter, but I get the feeling that it is more prevelant in Korea.

StuartA

01-11-2009, 06:18 PM

I think the story that the Koreans "took what they learned from the Japanese & made it their own, & took it around the world" is a better story for Korean national pride. Proven in combat in Vietnam alone should be proof that it works. And the best part is, It's true!
Yup.. it doesnt need the extra BS to give it relevance and credibility, as you say, it has that already. In fact, once the 2000 year history is disproven, it simply takes credibility away!

Stuart

StuartA

01-11-2009, 06:21 PM

Once you start believing lies because it's convenient you will believe any number of them

And as they say.. a lie becomes bigger by the telling and if told enough eventually becomes the truth.. at least I think thats what they hoped!

I understand the 'National Pride' thing in the early days, but those days are gone and it just makes TKD look bad to not give its history out correctly. As Iceman says, its real history is pretty decent anyway!

Stuart

Makalakumu

01-11-2009, 06:24 PM

Miles - here's an interesting thought I've had for some time. Lets say we dump the history and just consider TKD as a modern combat sport. Lets say we grab a competition rule book and design a curriculum based off of common sparring stances, high percentage techniques and combinations, lots of drilling and lots of sparring. Dump everything else. No poomse, no ill soo shik, no ho sin shul.

My guess is that you would produce a competitive fighter far beyond the caliber of fighter that a traditional TKD curriculum would produce.

It's these kinds of questions that lead me ask why we practice what we practice. What's the purpose of forms without application? What's the purpose of ill soo shik and ho sin shul that have no relationship to either sparring or forms? What's the purpose of practicing basics that have no relationship to sparring, ill soo shik, ho sin shul, or hyung? IMO, this is an ecclectic mess.

Miles, as a professional educator, I've learned that the way curriculum ties together is very important to its effectiveness. If the elements are disjointed, then you end up practicing them separately, with no relation. It spreads your time too thin and the skill level you attain in any of the elements is retarded.

There is a way to practice all of the elements together so that they interact synergistically and you get better at everything at a greater rate. It's all about alignment. When your curriculum is aligned toward a set of goals and the elements are zero-summed to fit those goals, you create synergistic learning opportunities.

So, what if TKD were trained like boxing? Boxing has alignment of its basics, combos, drills, and sparring toward a specific set of goals. The result is that the system produces high level practicioners who acheive great results.

StuartA

01-11-2009, 06:32 PM

To paraphrase Bruce Lee (a philosophy major), "Before I studied martial arts, a punch was just a punch, a kick just a kick. When I started training, a punch was no longer just a punch, a kick was no longer just a kick. Now that I've gained experience, a punch is just a punch a kick is just a kick."
That quote has more to do with the poectic license styling of Martial Arts than history I think, Im sure Bruce Lee looked into the history of things (as far as he could for his day) and didnt swallow BS lightly!

My take on history is that it doesn't really matter. It doesn't make my punches any stronger or my kicks any harder.
In a way I agree, but only if thats all your interested in, but even by doing that, you are taking the lessons from history already, as thats why kicks became faster/stronger etc. cos of thr history of the art. However, the main point is not about whether history needs to be told, but if it is (and it certainly is by most if not all orgs to give credence to what they teach) then ensure its the true history!

My senior Glenn U. convincingly argues that the Koreans took information from the Okinawans (i.e. not Japanese) and made it their own.
That I'd be interested in hearing.. just to hear his reasoning!

I don't see General Choi in the Kukkiwon's version of history. I also don't see Kwan founders GM Lee, Won Kuk, GM Chun, Sang Sup, GM Hwang Kee, GM Yoon, Byung In, GM Ro, Byung Jik, GM Park, Chull Hee, GM Lee, Kyo Yoon, or GM Lee, Yong Woo in the Kukkiwon's version of history.

I have General Choi's textbook. I don't see the aforementioned GMs in his book either.
Fair enough and I'm not standing in defence of Gen Choi, but the defence of the truth and all those that played an active part in TKD's history should be acknowledged for who they were/are and what role they played.

Stuart

MBuzzy

01-11-2009, 07:10 PM

Craig, is this an aspect of Korean culture or is it an aspect of the particular cultural block stretching from China over Korea to Japan? I would guess at the latter, but I get the feeling that it is more prevelant in Korea.

I have heard that it is an aspect of all Asian cultures, but I only have firsthand experience with the Koreans. It is certainly very deeply entrenched in their culture. I would assume that it comes from earlier Chinese influences though. China, Korea, and Japan are very similar in their feelings of honor, respect, and feelings toward their elders or superiors. I believe that much of this attitude comes from those attributes. Questioning a superior is considered disrespectful and always has been.

tellner

01-11-2009, 07:25 PM

Miles, I don't want you to take this wrong, but when it comes to separating truth from make believe it doesn't matter if someone appreciates it or not. History and science are not popularity contests. If what people discover causes pain I can only suggest that you invest less of your self-image in believing the lies.

The story of Da-Mo is actually relatively recent as these things go and has been debunked a long time ago. China had armies long before it was China, long before there was Buddhism. Ergo it had martial arts. Even if Da-Mo existed, which is sort of doubtful, he didn't create the Chinese martial arts as a form of exercise for lazy monks. There was Indian influence on Chinese culture over the millennia and vice versa. But the stories you've been told simply aren't accurate.

There was Chinese influence on Okinawan boxing. The Okinawa Te I did years back (Uechi Ryu) has obvious Southern Crane roots. But that's just one or two schools and a certain amount of influence. The direct line of descent and ancient legitimacy isn't there. The "peering through the fence" bit is one of the more popular myths about how take-your-pick stole the secrets of Chinese Kung Fu from the Masters even though he was a despised foreigner.

The founders of TKD almost all learned Japanese Karate, not Okinawan boxing. As others have pointed out, what they learned wasn't Okinawa Te anymore. It was repackaged with a new curriculum. And Funakoshi explicitly redesigned his martial art to appeal as a sport and self-development tool for an urban educated population. He was very up-front about the whole thing. Much as I despise the man personally you would be well advised to check out Rob Redmond's Shotokan Site (http://www.24fightingchickens.com).

Those are the facts. They might not make you happy. But that's what happened to the very best of our knowledge. The Korean government had to expunge every possible mention of Japanese influence. So they came up with a long series of lies. There was the Okinawan lie. There was the 1300 year old Taekyon as the true origin of TKD lie. There was the cave-paintings lie. There was the Hwarang lie. We have just about zip evidence for the historical existence of the Hwarang in any form let alone as a soldier caste not to mention the fables about them being super-warriors. It was just a convenient bit of propaganda. And the 2000 year old TKD legends? They can't be taken seriously.

The Korean government has lied to you through your teachers. If history really didn't matter to you the way you say it doesn't you'd say "Oh well, just more official BS," shrug and continue on. The fact that you are hurt by the revelations and immediately defend the stories shows that it does matter to you.

TKD started off as a Korean form of Shotokan with some Chinese and local influences. It changed into a modern form of kick-boxing with a distinctly Korean flavor. That's nothing to be proud or ashamed of. It says nothing about the quality of the system or its suitability for any particular application. It's simply how it happened. What matters is what you do with it.

tellner

01-11-2009, 07:28 PM

I understand the 'National Pride' thing in the early days, but those days are gone and it just makes TKD look bad to not give its history out correctly.

If people keep repeating the lies even after they've been debunked it leaves the false impression that TKD practitioners are liars. That's not true and not good for the reputation of the system or the people who practice it.

Besides, the Korean government has money. And there are lots of Koreans. If they want national identity and pride let them carry their own water. There's no reason to make yourself look foolish or credulous for their benefit.

StuartA

01-11-2009, 07:33 PM

If people keep repeating the lies even after they've been debunked it leaves the false impression that TKD practitioners are liars. That's not true and not good for the reputation of the system or the people who practice it.
I know, I just started a small campaign to get the TKD orgs to correct Do-Sans (http://www.martialtalk.com/forum/showthread.php?p=1102488#post1102488) birth date to the correct year :angel:

Stuart

arnisador

01-11-2009, 09:01 PM

If what people discover causes pain I can only suggest that you invest less of your self-image in believing the lies.

It's amazing to me how invested many Americans are in this story. I understand why it's culturally important for the Koreans, esp. since the Japanese colonization, but Americans?

The story of Da-Mo [...] has been debunked a long time ago.If nothing else, there simply isn't a shred of evidence to support it...let alone all the conflicting evidence, as you indicate.

There was Chinese influence on Okinawan boxing. The Okinawa Te I did years back (Uechi Ryu) has obvious Southern Crane roots.Uechi is almost literal Southern Chinese Kung Fu, brought to the Ryukyus about a hundred years ago, but all extant styles of Okinawan Karate show Chinese influence. If nothing else, many of the kata are clearly based, in name and pattern, on Southern Chinese forms.

The founders of TKD almost all learned Japanese Karate, not Okinawan boxing. As others have pointed out, what they learned wasn't Okinawa Te anymore. It was repackaged with a new curriculum. And Funakoshi explicitly redesigned his martial art to appeal as a sport and self-development tool for an urban educated population. He was very up-front about the whole thing.Even if the fact that the TKD founders studied Japanese Karate and originally began teaching what they referred to (in Korean) as Karate wasn't so well documented, the similarities in things like the patterns, uniforms, specific techniques (e.g the punch), etc., would be compelling evidence. That the Okinawan systems were modified in Japan is also very well documented and also apparent upon inspection of the arts.

The Korean government has lied to you through your teachers.Yes, but in fairness many of the founders also were nationalists at heart and bear some culpability for spreading falsehoods in the name of national pride and unity. Was it worth it at the time? I don't know the answer.

TKD started off as a Korean form of Shotokan with some Chinese and local influences. It changed into a modern form of kick-boxing with a distinctly Korean flavor. That's nothing to be proud or ashamed of. It says nothing about the quality of the system or its suitability for any particular application. It's simply how it happened. Full agreement, and I don't get why this is so complicated though I know it always is. The TKD article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TKD) at Wikipedia has zealous defenders of the Koreancentric position. To an extent it's like this in many arts but TKD is among the most myth-laden (apart from ninjutsu). The story is simple: Shotokan was brought back to Korea. It was mixed with some slight Chinese influences and filtered through a vision of lost KMAs and Korean culture, then prodded to become more sports-oriented, and ended up as a different art, Tae Kwon Do. Other KMAs grew with greater Chinese influence (Tang Soo Do) or jujutsu influences (Hapkido).

Looking a Kumdo and Yudo, which are barely modified versions of Japanese Kendo and Judo, respectively, why is this hard to believe?

The articles by S. Capener, R. Dohrenwend, D. Burdick, and S. Henning are good starts.

Makalakumu

01-11-2009, 10:24 PM

It all starts with changing your practice. Then you can branch out and talk to others. When the 100th monkey (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100th_Monkey)starts doing it, the myth will die out.

Miles

01-12-2009, 08:46 AM

Daniel Sullivan

01-12-2009, 09:52 AM

It's amazing to me how invested many Americans are in this story. I understand why it's culturally important for the Koreans, esp. since the Japanese colonization, but Americans?
Like it or not, Americans want the 4000 year old myth. We want to be connected to something that is greater than 232 years old. It is the same fascination that we have with the royal family in England. Even if modern monarchs are more figurehead than heads of state, we have an interest in them. We want to be connected with England's history because our own history as a sovereign nation only goes back a little over two hundred years.

Likewise, we want our MA to be this ancient tradition. Maybe we watched too many Kung Fu movies. Maybe we read too many comic books, but as a general rule, we have a mentality that a 4000 year old martial art is somehow superior to a fifty year old martial art.

Now, if taekwondo had been invented in the US, then we'd proudly proclaim that it is only about fifty years old. But because we didn't invent it, we don't see legitimacy in it if isn't packaged with some ancient tradition or currently used in some cutting edge military program, as told by the history chanel. That is the main reason for the interest in Krav Maga; Nothing against Krav Maga, but if it weren't used by the IDF against terrorists (that is the key; we're at war with terrorists), I doubt that the interest in the US would be as strong as it is.

And that is what it comes down to. Americans like the gimmick. And by gimmick, I mean sales gimmick. Krav Maga's gimmick is that it is used by the IDF and we aren't nearly as familiar with it as taekwondo. After all, you don't see mini mall Krav Maga grandmasters. BJJ's gimmick is that the Gracies beat a bunch of guys in the UFC with it. JKD schools' gimmick is Bruce Lee.

Taekwondo's current gimmick is the olympics, but since the olympics aren't a sure thing, given the lack of viewership, they need a non olympic gimmick. So enter the 4000 year old history, wherein taekwondo was handed to the Hwarang by the man on the silver mountain. And for that mini mall dojang king, he wants every gimmick he can get his hands on, as loss of any one can mean the loss of income.

Every art that I just mentioned is a good, solid MA that any serious practitioner can do well with, so don't take the work gimmick the wrong way; I certainly mean no disrespect to any aforementioned MA. I use it to describe what Americans collectively are drawn to. Americans like the gimmick and are willing to overlook an outright fraud if the gimmick is good enough. Americans also take the gimmick and use it as a sales pitch and become financially invested in it.

Couple that with the tendency that sometimes occurs in TMAs to take what your master says at face value and not quetion it. After all, when Daniel san questioned Mr. Myagi, we just knew that he should just do as Mr. Myagi asked him to and not question it, even though Myagi was having him paint his fence, wax his car, and sand his deck, things that had seemingly nothing to do with karate training. After all, Myagi was the master. The student should accept what his master says without question, right?

Personall, I'd rather the true history. It is much more interesting than the fabrication with the added bonus of being, well, true.

Daniel

YoungMan

01-12-2009, 10:57 AM

Daniel Sullivan

01-12-2009, 11:23 AM

I'd agree with you to a point on that, Youngman, but taekwondo doesn't really have a continuous process to connect it with Korea's past. It has strong roots in Shotokan Karate, with its Koreanization being performed largely after the fact.

The Koreans took something that was impressed upon them from outside, made it their own, and in doing so, created a whole new art. This is not the continuing process of an ancient KMA, but something new.

I cannot comment on your assessment of how Japan views its martial arts, as I don't have a strong background in JMA's.

Daniel

YoungMan

01-12-2009, 11:34 AM

MBuzzy

01-12-2009, 11:42 AM

To understand why there is little to no mention of the Kwan founders, or Gen Choi for that matter, on the Kukkiwon website, you must understand the Korean view of their martial arts. They see Korean martial arts as a continuous process throughout their history, whereas the Japanese see their arts as individual endeavors created by specific people over time.
You don't see the Kwans and their founders listed because the Koreans, in my opinion, do not consider it important as to who did what, but instead where the art is now and where it is going. To quote Yong Bok Lee, "one individual cannot take credit for the art as a whole."
And as we get further away from the era of the Kwans, this will become more the case.

That may be the case for TKD specifically, but isn't true of all Korean culture or the Korean view of all Martial Arts. The Koreans are interested in their heritage and history - in fact, I would venture to say that as a culture, they are just as interested, if not more than Americans. From the respect that they pay to their history, ancestors, culture, elders, and the "national treasures," their love of heritage is evident. In fact, in Tang Soo Do, almost any Dojang you go into will proudly display a photo of GM Hwang Kee and almost all Master trace their heritage to him. Their history just isn't as accurate as ours due to the way that histories are passed down.

Honestly, in this case, I would think that it is more a matter of trying to hide or de-emphasize something based on the organizational goals.

chrispillertkd

01-12-2009, 11:42 AM

Like it or not, Americans want the 4000 year old myth. We want to be connected to something that is greater than 232 years old. It is the same fascination that we have with the royal family in England. Even if modern monarchs are more figurehead than heads of state, we have an interest in them. We want to be connected with England's history because our own history as a sovereign nation only goes back a little over two hundred years.

Let's just keep in mind that this is a rather sweeping generalization. I know plenty of Americans who think the notion put forth by the Kukkiwon is complete bunk and are completely happy with tracing their lineage back to the particular Kwan form which they come.

And that is what it comes down to. Americans like the gimmick. And by gimmick, I mean sales gimmick. Krav Maga's gimmick is that it is used by the IDF and we aren't nearly as familiar with it as taekwondo. After all, you don't see mini mall Krav Maga grandmasters. BJJ's gimmick is that the Gracies beat a bunch of guys in the UFC with it. JKD schools' gimmick is Bruce Lee.

Taekwondo's current gimmick is the olympics, but since the olympics aren't a sure thing, given the lack of viewership, they need a non olympic gimmick. So enter the 4000 year old history, wherein taekwondo was handed to the Hwarang by the man on the silver mountain. And for that mini mall dojang king, he wants every gimmick he can get his hands on, as loss of any one can mean the loss of income.

Your comments here may or may not be correct. If it was, however, and given your comments about KM then I'd argue that Taekwon-Do has at least as potentially effective "gimmick" as its supposed thousands of year long history: it was, in fact, developed in a modern military setting as a supplement to training with firearms. Taekwon-Do was used as a training tool for ROK soldiers during the Korean War (or, rather, the Tang Soo that would eventually become Taekwon-Do). Gen. Choi and his instructors in the Oh Do Kwan during the Korean War began developing the art during that would eventually lead the ROK army during the Viet Namese war being a feared enemy of the Viet Cong.

Rooted in tradition (karate via the various Kwans); modern (developed during the late 40s to early 50s); effective (used by Korean soldiers). Pretty good if you're interested in "marketing," I'd say.

Pax,

Chris

MBuzzy

01-12-2009, 11:46 AM

To me, modern Taekwondo can rightfully say it owes very little to Japanese arts. As such, the Kwan history plays an increasingly small part in current Taekwondo other than being a part of a particular moment in the history of Korean martial arts.

Modern TKD may have evolved and moved past where it was 50 years ago, but I wouldn't say that it owes nothing to one of its major influences. If nothing else, just an acknowledgment that at one point in its history, the Japanese did have an influence. I just don't understand why the Koreans and so many people are SO adamant about DENYING any influence of other styles. It detracts nothing from the modern art to admit that things were learned from other styles at some point in history.

To this day in Korea, many of the older people HATE the Japanese with a passion. Not only those who were alive during the occupation, but those who have heard the story. It is really only the youngest generation that is willing to forgive the Japanese for some of the attrocities done to them and their families. But it is still a part of their history - they just choose to try to ignore it and hate the country that perpetrated it. I think that the Japanese occupation is much of the reason for trying to completely separate ANY Korean links to Japan, even when it is so overwhelmingly evident.

exile

01-12-2009, 11:47 AM

chrispillertkd

01-12-2009, 11:53 AM

The Chinese took information from an Indian Buddhist monk and made it their own. The Okinawans took information from the Chinese and made it their own. The Japanese took information from the Okinawans and made it their own. My senior Glenn U. convincingly argues that the Koreans took information from the Okinawans (i.e. not Japanese) and made it their own.

Can you expound on the connection between the Okinawans and the Koreans that he argues for? I'd be very interested in hearing this as the main influence on the various Kwans was Shotokan (Chung Do Kwan, Oh Do Kwan) and Shudokan (Ji Do Kwan). There was some influence from Chinese Chuan Fa (Chang Moo Kwan), but this seems to have been a minor on Taelwon-Do in comparison to that from karate.

In any event, I'd be very interested in seeing the evidence for this claim as I enjoy doing a little armchair research on martial arts history in general and Taekwon-Do history in particular.

I don't see General Choi in the Kukkiwon's version of history. I also don't see Kwan founders GM Lee, Won Kuk, GM Chun, Sang Sup, GM Hwang Kee, GM Yoon, Byung In, GM Ro, Byung Jik, GM Park, Chull Hee, GM Lee, Kyo Yoon, or GM Lee, Yong Woo in the Kukkiwon's version of history.

The fact that the Kwan founders are left out of official accounts of Taekwon-Do history is shameful. Without them we wouldn't have Taekwon-Do.

I have General Choi's textbook. I don't see the aforementioned GMs in his book either.

They are mentioned in his autobiography.

Also, I will say that in his books Gen. Choi at least mentions the existence of the Chung Do Kwan (as well as his own Oh Do Kwan) and makes no bones what so ever about having received training in Shotokan. When I started hearing this 2,000 year old stuff my initial reaction was "What are you people talking about???" At least some people know the roots of Taekwon-Do (and we're fine with it, btw!).

Pax,

Chris

Twin Fist

01-12-2009, 11:59 AM

Honestly, in this case, I would think that it is more a matter of trying to hide or de-emphasize something based on the organizational goals.

quoted for truth

Daniel Sullivan

01-12-2009, 12:02 PM

To the contrary, it may have been originally strongly connected to Shotokan in the past, but now bears little resemblance to it-to the point where it stands completely on its own. I've watched Shotokan videos on Youtube, and modern Taekwondo looks little to nothing like it or any other Japanese art. It doesn't matter what aspect you're talking about either. I've also seen clips of Taekwondo from 50 years ago, and there are similarities but many differences.
To the contrary?? That's what I just said: It has strong roots in Shotokan Karate, with its Koreanization being performed largely after the fact. The Koreans took something that was impressed upon them from outside, made it their own, and in doing so, created a whole new art.

To me, modern Taekwondo can rightfully say it owes very little to Japanese arts.
That is a bit like saying that a man born in 1944 shouldn't put their father's name in their geneology because his dad left when he was young and he owes relatively little of who he is as 64 year old adult to him. While the man is a unique person, he still carries his father's dna and his early life will have been shaped by his father's relation to his mother and his father's early departure.

Point of fact, had shotokan been introduced to Korea the way that taekwondo had been instroduced to the US, taekwondo may never have been created. But because it was introduced via a brutal occupation, the Koreans were motivated to take it and change the most visible fascets (forms and sparring) as much as possible to make it not only not Japanese, but eventually, more Korean.

As such, the Kwan history plays an increasingly small part in current Taekwondo other than being a part of a particular moment in the history of Korean martial arts.
Yes, and it is history that is being discussed. And neither this, nor anything else that you have stated justifies the fabrication of a 4000 year old history.

Daniel

Twin Fist

01-12-2009, 12:02 PM

So does mine. So does anyone's if they still use the Chong Han forms, you know, the ORIGINAL TKD forms, since they are Shotokan forms rearranged.

Our TKD looks a lot like Shotokan. And a lot of other people's does as well, and for the best of reason. Our TKD comes in a straight lineage from Byung Jik Ro, founder of one of the five original Kwans. Yours doesn't look like Shotokan? Fine.

Just don't confuse what you do with what everyone else, or anyone else does, or should do, and things will be just fine.

Daniel Sullivan

01-12-2009, 12:22 PM

Let's just keep in mind that this is a rather sweeping generalization. I know plenty of Americans who think the notion put forth by the Kukkiwon is complete bunk and are completely happy with tracing their lineage back to the particular Kwan form which they come.

Of course its a sweeping generalization. I'm an American and I think that the notion put forth by the Kukkiwon is complete bunk. I'm talking about the general public, not those of us who have taken the time to dig into history. By and large, if its presented as having a 4000 year old history on television or the internet, then most people just accept it. Yes, there are exceptions, but if every school kept getting comments about the TKD history on their website being a fabrication, nobody would put it up.

Your comments here may or may not be correct. If it was, however, and given your comments about KM then I'd argue that Taekwon-Do has at least as potentially effective "gimmick" as its supposed thousands of year long history: it was, in fact, developed in a modern military setting as a supplement to training with firearms. Taekwon-Do was used as a training tool for ROK soldiers during the Korean War (or, rather, the Tang Soo that would eventually become Taekwon-Do). Gen. Choi and his instructors in the Oh Do Kwan during the Korean War began developing the art during that would eventually lead the ROK army during the Viet Namese war being a feared enemy of the Viet Cong.

Rooted in tradition (karate via the various Kwans); modern (developed during the late 40s to early 50s); effective (used by Korean soldiers). Pretty good if you're interested in "marketing," I'd say.

Pax,

Chris
I totally agree. But TKD's military background and martial application isn't the sales gimmick used to promote taekwondo in the USA, and it hasn't been for a very long time. Taekwondo is promoted via the use of the olympics and in order to lend it the legitimacy of long standing martial arts, a fabricated history was provided. And while I agree with your last sentence, such marketing isn't used by the KKW for nationalistic reasons.

I'm just disappointed that nobody caught my 'man on the silver mountain' reference.:p

Daniel

DarkPhoenix

01-12-2009, 12:30 PM

So does mine. So does anyone's if they still use the Chong Han forms, you know, the ORIGINAL TKD forms, since they are Shotokan forms rearranged.

Our looks a lot like Shotokan, as noted in my thread about CDK and KKW. If you didn't hear the Korean being spoken, you would think that it was SHotokan with more kicks.

MBuzzy

01-12-2009, 12:46 PM

As such, the Kwan history plays an increasingly small part in current Taekwondo other than being a part of a particular moment in the history of Korean martial arts.

Yes, and it is history that is being discussed. And neither this, nor anything else that you have stated justifies the fabrication of a 4000 year old history.

Just to emphasize here....a particularly CRUCIAL part of their history at the exact right moment. Without the influence of other styles, most KMAs wouldn't exist....so I fail to see how this is such a small part of modern TKD. Just because it has evolved doesn't mean that it owes any less to its heritage.

arnisador

01-12-2009, 12:59 PM

To the contrary, it may have been originally strongly connected to Shotokan in the past, but now bears little resemblance to it[...]I've watched Shotokan videos on Youtube, and modern Taekwondo looks little to nothing like it or any other Japanese art.

Perhaps this is true of your style--I believe you on this--but many TKD schools retain the stances, hand techniques, and forms of Japanese Karate. The kicks are different but on acen see the connections. Technically, they're more similar than many of the Okinawan Karate styles are to Shotokan. Isshin and Uechi, for example, are less similar to Shotokan in appearance than is the typical TKD style.

To me, modern Taekwondo can rightfully say it owes very little to Japanese arts.I suppose that Japanese Karate has a sufficiently tangential similarity to the Southern Chinese styles that on could make a similar statement about them--there's an historical link, a lineage, but the influences are now hard to decipher in most techniques. But the TKD-Karate connection is more recent and more direct. Yes, TKD is its own style and stands on its own and those who made it what it is today have truly created something different; but as always they stood on the shoulders of those who came before.

dancingalone

01-12-2009, 01:27 PM

Perhaps this is true of your style--I believe you on this--but many TKD schools retain the stances, hand techniques, and forms of Japanese Karate. The kicks are different but on acen see the connections. Technically, they're more similar than many of the Okinawan Karate styles are to Shotokan. Isshin and Uechi, for example, are less similar to Shotokan in appearance than is the typical TKD style.

I suppose that Japanese Karate has a sufficiently tangential similarity to the Southern Chinese styles that on could make a similar statement about them--there's an historical link, a lineage, but the influences are now hard to decipher in most techniques. But the TKD-Karate connection is more recent and more direct. Yes, TKD is its own style and stands on its own and those who made it what it is today have truly created something different; but as always they stood on the shoulders of those who came before.

True. I'm frankly amused by the attempts to excise karate out of the TKD family tree. I suppose it's like Al Pacino's family in Scent of a Woman wishing embarrassing Uncle Frank wasn't around....

And I don't care what type of taekwondo you practice, it's still bound to be a lot close to Shotokan karate than it will be some other art like tai chi chuan.

Twin Fist

01-12-2009, 03:04 PM

I love that my TKD, the original TKD is so like Shotokan

that Olympic style crap they (the koreans)have turned it into is a disgrace to martial arts.

arnisador

01-12-2009, 03:08 PM

Well, it's a successful sport, and that's fine...but they try to sell it as all things to all people, and it just ain't.

I've also seen strongly self-defense oriented TKD done. It's a different focus!

YoungMan

01-12-2009, 03:17 PM

I love that my TKD, the original TKD is so like Shotokan

that Olympic style crap they (the koreans)have turned it into is a disgrace to martial arts.

So practice Shotokan. I've never trained for the Olympics a day in my life.

MBuzzy

01-12-2009, 03:23 PM

So practice Shotokan. I've never trained for the Olympics a day in my life.

I don't believe that anyone wants to replace TKD with Shotokan. There is most certainly a difference, even with much older versions of TKD. It was "translated" into Korean, not adopted directly. It was an influence into the creation of the Korean styles, not the sole basis.

Personally, I'm proud of acknowledge the wide range of influences to Korean Martial Arts. They incorporate ideas from both China and Japan to create a unique style. What I personally would love to understand - as many others would as well - is why so many people with so many resources to the contrary simply don't want to admit to any Japanese involvement. Well, either not admit it or just try to brush it under the carpet.

Daniel Sullivan

01-12-2009, 03:35 PM

I love that my TKD, the original TKD is so like Shotokan

that Olympic style crap they (the koreans)have turned it into is a disgrace to martial arts.

I don't mind the WTF style, which is the appropriate term, particularly if it nixed from the olympics after the next summer games.

I wouldn't call it a disgrace to martial arts. That is a bit harsh, though I do feel that the behavior of some of the players last year left a bit to be desired. Still, the actions of a few should not be damning of the tournament rule set.

For developing strong kicking, it is quite nice, and it is a fun style. I like the fact that it it full contact and continuous, and I like the fact that it imposes a unique situation where kicks are the primary weapon of choice. I do feel that the WTF should develope a more realistic set of sparring rules to compliment the current style, one that would allow sweeps and takedowns and a greater range of hand techniques.

To my knowledge, it was developed by the Jidokwan specifically to distance TKD from Shotokan. That is something that was told to me some time back; no citations, so if I am incorrect, I'd actually like to know.

I don't believe that it should be considered a substitute for SD training and I certainly don't feel that sport only schools should call themselves taekwondo schools.

WTF style fighting is essentially a Korean style of kickboxing. If a school wants to focus on sport only, they should call it Korean Kickboxing, not Taekwondo.

Daniel

Makalakumu

01-12-2009, 03:39 PM

That Olympic style crap they (the koreans)have turned it into is a disgrace to martial arts.

Lets not go that far, TF. IMO, Olympic TKD is probably the MOST Korean form of TKD. From my experience, the more "traditional" you get, the more the TKD starts to look like Shotokan.

Olympic TKD is a combat sport like boxing. It was conceived of in Korea and it represents something that was truly innovated in Korea.

The problem with Olympic TKD is that it pretends to be something that its not. When you've got high level competitors practicing basics, combinations, and drills for the ring AND you have them do hyung, ill soo shik, and ho sin shul, the latter three suffer because that isn't the focus.

So, the art looks like crap and gets trashed by people who watch. IMO, Olympic TKD would get better publicity and would produce better fighters if they just dropped the karate pretense.

Daniel Sullivan

01-12-2009, 03:47 PM

So practice Shotokan. I've never trained for the Olympics a day in my life.
No, but if you spar using the WTF rules, then you are training in the style of Taekwondo sparring used in the olympics.

Perhaps Twin's choice of the word, 'Olympic' is not the technically correct, but anyone who watched or is familiar with Olympic taekwondo will know instantly what he's talking about.

Daniel

Twin Fist

01-12-2009, 04:34 PM

thats ok, i expected a snotty comment from Young Man, it is what he does. Eveyone has a purpose, thats his.

thats just par the course:

"Black is sinister, i dont trust people that wear black"
and the classic:
"I know REAL sparring and groin kicks are too dangerous"

pffft

I said what i meant and meant what i said

Olympic style crap

I dont care how strong thier kicks are, if they aint used to getting punched in the face, I know how to beat them. That aint TKD, it is, if anything, Korean kickboxing, like someone said. Call it that and I wont have a problem with it.

But dont call it TKD, dont call it a martial art.

I hear "Martial art" I dont think some sport, i think self defense. And WTF style olympic sparring has as much to do with self defense as a hot dog does with a warm fluffy puppy. It may sound simular, but it aint even close.

oh, and while I am calling it like it is, that sine wave stuff? thats crap too.

what else.....lemme think, I am sure there is something else I can rag on.....
:soapbox:

Twin Fist

01-12-2009, 04:35 PM

i love channeling my inner jerk sometimes....

LOL

elder999

01-12-2009, 06:16 PM

oh, and while I am calling it like it is, that sine wave stuff? thats crap too.

Crap squared, even....:lol:

Twin Fist

01-12-2009, 06:44 PM

ok, i dont care who you are, that right there's funny!!

Daniel Sullivan

01-12-2009, 08:36 PM

I dont care how strong thier kicks are, if they aint used to getting punched in the face, I know how to beat them. That aint TKD, it is, if anything, Korean kickboxing, like someone said. Call it that and I wont have a problem with it.

But dont call it TKD, dont call it a martial art.
That was me, and I agree; call it kickboxing. I still maintain that WTF sparring is a nice adjunct to the martial art of Taekwondo. It showcases the kicks in a way that is unique. I don't have a problem with it in and of itself until it becomes the end goal.

As a facet of taekwondo it is fine, but if the main focus, or indeed only focus in training is to be competative in that style of sparring on the tournament circuit, then it is incomplete. Kind of like learning how to work a stick shift without ever training in driving the car. Sure, you can row gears faster than anyone, but until the engine starts, it is a skill that exists in a vacuum.

Daniel

Makalakumu

01-12-2009, 09:04 PM

If boxing is a martial art, why isn't Olympic TKD?

Twin Fist

01-12-2009, 09:09 PM

i dont consider boxing a martial art.

that being said:

Martial Art= self defense

boxing CAN be used for self defense

try that hands down all kicking stuff on the street.

I will make sure your parents know you didnt feel much pain.........

Daniel Sullivan

01-12-2009, 09:38 PM

If boxing is a martial art, why isn't Olympic TKD?
For one, there is a good amount of debate as to whether or not boxing is a martial art. Boxing certainly does qualify as martial sport, and so does WTF sparring. Martial art? That's a can of worms for someone else to open.

The issue isn't whether or not "olympic taekwondo" is a martial art: nobody maintains that it is. All agree that it is the kyorugi of Kukkiwon taekwondo, not the martial art in its entirety.

The issue that people who train exclusively for the sport or primarilly in such a way that their fighting is good only in that specific sport setting are really not training in taekwondo. They're just doing a very focused form of kickboxing, then get offended when those who study the art in its entirety point out that they are cutting out large portions of the art, taekwondo, but still calling it taekwondo.

Kind of like removing the transmission from a car, fixing it up, painting the casing, and making it picture perfect, putting it on a stand in the middle of your garage and calling it a car.

exile

01-12-2009, 09:50 PM

I love that my TKD, the original TKD is so like Shotokan

that Olympic style crap they (the koreans)have turned it into is a disgrace to martial arts.

Here's my take on it, TF. If someone wants to do the version of TKD that is guided by a strategy designed for Olympic-style point-scoring, that's 100% fine with me. It's not something I want to do myself, but I won't say boo about someone else doing it. To each their own.

But by the same token, I won't accept self-satisfied put-downs of the kind one sometimes sees, even here on MT :rolleyes:—that what is in fact a very traditional style of TKD, reflecting both the Shotokan training of its founders and the harsh military role it was called upon to play in the defense of the ROK, should be dissed because it's 'too Japanese'. When citizens of the US start echoing a party line which makes perfect sense for a certain kind of Korean nationalism, but no sense at all for members of an open western society where we don't equate truth with the party line.... it's time for a few mocking raspberries and horse-laughs. The fact of the matter is that whatever style of TKD you do, even the most WTFish, you should be offended at the outright falsehoods and historical distortions that the KKW/WTF puts out about the history of TKD. Orwell called it Newthink in 1984—mass-produced lies about the past that give carte blanche to the leadership of a docile-sheep society to do precisely what they want. The OP of this thread was, if I read it right, a cry of pain at the way this policy of historical distortion has attempted to erase incontrovertible, deeply documented facts about the origins of our art, for purposes of a foreign national bureaucracy whose interests have nothing to do with our own. Whether or not you love WTF-style TKD, surely it's clear that well-funded, high profile campaign of lying and distortion in an effort to promote a partisan agenda is a corrupting practice that does nothing but ratify the power of those in power?

The truth of TKD's history is fine and distinguished. But the most important thing about is that it is the truth. Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free—haven't we heard that before, somewhere? No matter what your beliefs are, surely we hold in the end that we'd rather know the truth, whatever it is, than be sold a bill of goods by sharpies who'd play us like puppets if we let them?

Daniel Sullivan

01-12-2009, 10:24 PM

The fact of the matter is that whatever style of TKD you do, even the most WTFish, you should be offended at the outright falsehoods and historical distortions that the KKW/WTF puts out about the history of TKD. Orwell called it Newthink in 1984—mass-produced lies about the past that give carte blanche to the leadership of a docile-sheep society to do precisely what they want. The OP of this thread was, if I read it right, a cry of pain at the way this policy of historical distortion has attempted to erase incontrovertible, deeply documented facts about the origins of our art, for purposes of a foreign national bureaucracy whose interests have nothing to do with our own. Whether or not you love WTF-style TKD, surely it's clear that well-funded, high profile campaign of lying and distortion in an effort to promote a partisan agenda is a corrupting practice that does nothing but ratify the power of those in power?
Thank you, Exile for bringing this thread back on topic.:) This is ideed the heart of the matter. The value of WTF style sparring is not the issue, love it or hate it. The issue is the blatant revisionist history being put out for purely nationalistic reasons and which is being spread by those not even of the same nation. True, this fabrication is one that is easily debunked.... for now. But what about when the record is so badly distorted that taekwondo's true origins are lost, and those with first hand and even direct second hand accounts are no longer living to stand up for the factual events?

Earlier in this thread, one poster indicated that the pracitce of his art was more important than the history of it. On a personal level, this is true; knowing the history but being a poor practitioner is rather worthless unless you're a martial historian.

Where it becomes an issue is when the intent of our techniques are being researched. When in the more in depth study of our art, we look to the origins of the techiques to better understand them. If our technique is Shotokan derived, but we keep finding Subak and Taekyeon in our history, then where do we go to look? Subak and Taekyeon. So now you study Taekyeon to better understand Taekwondo, but the execution of the kicks is entirely different. Now you've hit a dead. Now the search begins for a 'missing link' Korean art that was combined with Taekyeon, the records of which were surely destroyed by the Japanese during the occupation. But by gum, it must be there, because the kicks in modern TKD are not Taekyeon kicks. And so the search begins.

But it is nothing but a fruitless rabbit trail and a waste of time. Not because the records were destroyed, mind you, but because some group of insecure individuals couldn't handle admitting that there was any Japanese influence in Korea's most popular MA, so they simply lied and covered it up. Not only that, now there is speculation about the techiques of a nonexistant MA and the factors that led to its creation, and why it died out in favor of taekwondo. Perhaps evidence that really supports something else is then misinterpreted to be evidence of this nonexistant MA.

When National interests bear down on the origins of a martial art, something that has zero bearing on public policy, the MA will suffer and its developement be hindered. Then something truely Korean, truely spectacular, and truely worthwhile will have been lost.

That is why history of a martial art matters.

Daniel

Makalakumu

01-12-2009, 10:56 PM

i dont consider boxing a martial art.

I started a thread to this topic here (http://www.martialtalk.com/forum/showthread.php?p=1103140#post1103140).

Makalakumu

01-12-2009, 11:01 PM

terryl965

01-13-2009, 08:07 AM

People People People we all know that history is just that history go on with your lifes, live in the present day and train for you and nobody else. With that I bid a fond adue.

arnisador

01-13-2009, 10:01 AM

People People People we all know that history is just that history go on with your lifes, live in the present day and train for you and nobody else. With that I bid a fond adue.

I respect your opinion and that of anyone who focuses strongly on his or her training rather than being distracted by the political nonsense, but I do think it matters! As others have said, if you know the roots it's easier to trace back to the meaning. In Modern Arnis we went back to its Balintawak Eskrima roots to see what techniques had been modified to form our art, and it was very enlightening! Same with studying Wing Chun to enlighten my JKD. It matters in principle, and it matters in practice.

YoungMan

01-13-2009, 11:07 AM

dancingalone

01-13-2009, 11:21 AM

As I said before, Koreans see their martial arts history as as integrated whole, not compartmentalized into specific systems created by specific people a la Japanese karate. As such, who did what is not important, and one person cannot take credit for the art as a whole. This is something, I believe, many people have a hard time with. They want to give specific people credit for specific things, and Korean martial arts don't work like that.

I'm curious what the basis is for your statement, YM. Hapkido and its derivations like Kuk Sool seem to be personality driven where students, Koreans included, are strongly loyal to one grandmaster or another.

exile

01-13-2009, 11:50 AM

In 50 years, no one will know who the Kwan leaders were, just like no one now knows who did what to contribute to Korean martial arts from 200 years ago.
As I said before, Koreans see their martial arts history as as integrated whole, not compartmentalized into specific systems created by specific people a la Japanese karate. As such, who did what is not important, and one person cannot take credit for the art as a whole. This is something, I believe, many people have a hard time with. They want to give specific people credit for specific things, and Korean martial arts don't work like that.
Along these same lines, Taekwondo 100 years from now will undoubtably be different. In what ways I don't know. The people who made it different (they may be unborn, they may be typing this right now) will not matter so much as the end product.

Well, there is the business about, you know... writing, and the fact that whereas for most of their history people didn't write things down about their arts, for whatever reason, these days most people are literate and few are trying to keep secrets. The work of professional MA historians is not going to disappear in 100 years; we have written histories from ancient Greece, the Dark Ages, the Renaissance and the beginning of the modern era, all sitting nicely on our library shelves. And people consult them and rexamine them and quote them. All of the research that's been done, published, put on microfiche and electronic archives is just going to disappear... just, pfff, like that? Oh yes...:lfao:

So the history is disappearing because Taekwondo is bigger than its individual parts, not because of Kwan leaders from 50 years ago.

Let's call things by their right names, YM. TKD history is disappearing because of a propaganda effort by a bunch of Korean government bureaucrats making a deliberate effort to deny a crucial part of their martial arts history, in order to promote nationalist glory and their own profits. 'Taekwondo is bigger than its individual part?' Well, what isn't?? That's supposed to explain anything?? Name me a social institution that isn't bigger than its individual parts—does that mean that the history England, or the Civil Rights movement, or Christianity is disappearing? When you have fundamental new discoveries made about these every year, and more and more work keeps coming out? Let's get real, OK? TKD history is in danger of disappearing for the same reasons the bloody history of the Soviet Union in the Stalinist and post-Stalinist era was in danger of disappearing: because it was actively suppressed by apparatchiks with an interest in promoting a groteque myth about the Soviet state. The leadership of Japan has for years tried to suppress the history of Japanese crimes against its Asian neighbors during the first half of the 20th century for much the same reasons.

Sonorous-sounding phrases with no explanatory force are poor substitute for calling a spade a spade. There is one reason only why TKD history is in jeopardy: because it suits the purpose of ROK sporteaucrats to lie about it. End of story.

Daniel Sullivan

01-13-2009, 12:00 PM

In 50 years, no one will know who the Kwan leaders were, just like no one now knows who did what to contribute to Korean martial arts from 200 years ago.
As I said before, Koreans see their martial arts history as as integrated whole, not compartmentalized into specific systems created by specific people a la Japanese karate. As such, who did what is not important, and one person cannot take credit for the art as a whole. This is something, I believe, many people have a hard time with. They want to give specific people credit for specific things, and Korean martial arts don't work like that.
Along these same lines, Taekwondo 100 years from now will undoubtably be different. In what ways I don't know. The people who made it different (they may be unborn, they may be typing this right now) will not matter so much as the end product.
So the history is disappearing because Taekwondo is bigger than its individual parts, not because of Kwan leaders from 50 years ago.
This is a very weak arguement. You're essentially saying that since people will forget about it anyway, then it is perfectly fine to fabricate a fake history to make Taekwondo appear to be cohesive with ancient Korean martial arts. That is a very, very slippery slope indeed. And it doesn't even address the issues of researching techniques and their origins, which has been brought up on this thread by more than one person.

And comparing it to how the Japanese record their martial history is just a red herring. It is one thing for the history to simply disappear due to lack of comparative interest. It is quite another for history less than a century old to be actively rewritten, particularly when some of those involved in that history are still living.

Maybe you are happy to be lied to. Or maybe you just don't care. But there is no argument that you can put forth that will justify what is being done with the history of one of the worlds most popular martial arts.

And perhaps that is the big issue. It is no longer an MA owned by Korea. Korea gave it to the world. If taekwondo were soley a Korean activity, it would still be a crime to lie about its history and to erase the record. But this is our martial art, not just the government of SK's or the KKW's. We do have a duty to preserve its history.

Daniel

exile

01-13-2009, 12:06 PM

Maybe you are happy to be lied to. Or maybe you just don't care. But there is no argument that you can put forth that will justify what is being done with the history of one of the worlds most popular martial arts.

And perhaps that is the big issue. It is no longer an MA owned by Korea. Korea gave it to the world. If taekwondo were soley a Korean activity, it would still be a crime to lie about its history and to erase the record. But this is our martial art, not just the government of SK's or the KKW's. We do have a duty to preserve its history.

Daniel

Beautifully put, and the exactly right point. IOU rep.

DarkPhoenix

01-13-2009, 02:03 PM

History disappears all the time as Daniel and Exile stated. Take a look at Pankration. It was a Martial Art that was "lost" for so long, they had to pull from other MAs to fill the gaps. I think that with the way TKD has proliferated around the world, the history will never truly disappear, but the way it may be interpreted will, since there are so many cultures that it has touched, and have touched it. There are enough people out there who know the history that whatever the KKW does to "change" the history will pretty much just nullified by the people in the MA community that will pass it on.

dancingalone

01-13-2009, 03:16 PM

There are enough people out there who know the history that whatever the KKW does to "change" the history will pretty much just nullified by the people in the MA community that will pass it on.

Is there no one from the KKW camp who believes the facts should just stand for themselves without inappropriate 'coloring' and 'shading'? Surely, a rational person would recognize that playing with the facts only costs you in credibility and standing from your peers and potential customers?

Daniel Sullivan

01-13-2009, 04:05 PM

Is there no one from the KKW camp who believes the facts should just stand for themselves without inappropriate 'coloring' and 'shading'? Surely, a rational person would recognize that playing with the facts only costs you in credibility and standing from your peers and potential customers?
I'm a KKW yudanja. I even have membership in USAT. Do I count?:p

Daniel

DarkPhoenix

01-13-2009, 04:17 PM

Is there no one from the KKW camp who believes the facts should just stand for themselves without inappropriate 'coloring' and 'shading'? Surely, a rational person would recognize that playing with the facts only costs you in credibility and standing from your peers and potential customers?

I'm not in the KKW camp. :-) Never was. I trained ITF before I got into CDK, and we are independent.

dancingalone

01-13-2009, 04:18 PM

I'm a KKW yudanja. I even have membership in USAT. Do I count?:p

Daniel

Sorry, Daniel. Not until you sew on at least 5 more stripes. :)

Daniel Sullivan

01-13-2009, 04:43 PM

I'll hit the craft store on the way home.:p

Daniel

exile

01-13-2009, 08:31 PM

Sorry, Daniel. Not until you sew on at least 5 more stripes. :)

:lfao: Great line... but maybe a bit risky, d.a., come to think of it. It might give someone a mistaken idea about the next tactic to try in this discussion... :rolleyes:

And in connection with the point that Spookey raised, and the substitution of bogus propaganda and feel-good mystification for real documented history, I can't help noting the laughable irony of the comment that

They want to give specific people credit for specific things, and Korean martial arts don't work like that.

What the true, documented history of TKD shows, as was pointed out very nicely above, is almost exactly the opposite. From the very beginning, the particular Korean martial art we're talking about has been pushed and shoved around by 'specific people' anxious to use it for their own personal advancement, glory or what have you—and the results show. The following are well-supported by publically available historical records:

Early on, the Korean military decided that a standardized adaptation of the Kwan-taught Tang Soo Do/Kong Soo Do curriculum, largely Shotokan karate (though Shudokan was also part of the mix) was to be taught to the ROK infantry and especially its elite commando units specifically for combat purposes. This initiative was driven largely by Syngman Rhee, who had assumed dictatorial powers even prior to the Korean War. Rhee applied enormous, brutal pressure to the Kwans (including virtually imprisoning Lee Kuk-Won) to become an instrumentality of the military dictatorship andcome up with a uniform, field-effective H2H combative system, a situation which gave then Col. Choi his opening—as a military man and a Kwan leader—to assume what was in effect executive control of the development of TKD. The whole early development of TKD was driven by the personalities of Rhee and Choi...
...leading to the rift within TKD down the middle of the Moo Duk Kwan, the fracturing of the striking KMAs into TKD and TSD, the persecution of Hwang Kee (including his house partly burning down amidst very suspicious circumstances) and his eventual self-exile...
... followed, ironically, by a similar fate for Gen. Choi as a result of his ill-advised trip North, playing into his many enemies' hands, chief among them the nasty dictator Gen. Park, who had deposed the nasty dictator Rhee. Just as had happened with Hwang Kee, Gen. Choi went into exile, establishing a distinctive TKD style which minimized the sport competitive element glorified by the TKDeaucrats of the WTF/KKW who superseded him.

As a result of all these rebellions (by individuals) and suppressions (by individuals and their gangs), we wound up with three seriously different varieties of the striking KMAs, with very different attitudes and emphases: TSD, exiled, with its explicit self-identification as Korean karate and a corresponding emphasis on Japanese kata and bunkai; the ITF, exiled, with its Chang Hon tuls, sine wave movement and other aspects imposed personally by the General, with its relatively low emphasis on tournament competition, and WTF/KKW TKD, firmly in the saddle in Korea, with its virtually total commitment to the sportification of a once feared combative system, with corruption scandals and bribery disgraces largely (I suspect, anyway) as a result of its contamination by the IOC, surely one of the most corrupt, disgraceful sports organizations of all time, and all that cash that Olympic activities seem to be awash in.

Does this picture, every detail of which can be documented in minute detail (see Eric Madis, 'The evolution of Taekwondo from Japanese Karate'. In Martial Arts in the Modern World, ed. by Thomas Green, Prager Publishing, which I mentioned earlier, for a brilliant bird's-eye-view of the evidence for this picture) have anything at all to do with the bolded passage in the text I quoted above? Could anyone say that it does and keep a straight face? Actions by individuals are swamped by the collective will of the majority of KMAists, we're supposed to believe? Then why were the Palgwe's dropped as the KKW colored belt sequence two years after being adopted by their technical committee? The will of Korean MAists, you say?? Like hell it was—read the gory details here (http://www.martialtalk.com/forum/showthread.php?p=616236&highlight=Palgwes+steal#post616236); the gist of what happened, from Master Mclain's post, is that

They were replaced only two years after their inception in 1972 by the 8 Taek Guek forms because of a Korean Master that attended the KTA Palgue clinics in 1972 and learned these forms during their introduction. He returned to the US and published the first English book on these forms as an attempt to help the KTA and show the world what was created. He even dedicated the book to Kim Um-Yong, KTA President.

This same Korean Master also published an article on the 1967 version of Koryo hyung in the Karate Illustrated Magazine in 1973. Because this Master didn't join the KTA(WTF) and instead preserved the old karate and chuan-fa forms from his old kwan, many KTA officials were angry that he was the first to publish and thought he was trying to steal the forms. So, they (KTA/WTF) changed the Gup-level requirements from Palgue 1-8 to the new 1974 forms Tau Guek 1-8 and created a new version of Koryo.

The first book on Paglue forms in "Palgue 1-2-3 of TaeKwondo Hyung," by Kim Soo. Ohara Publications, 1973.

For years he (Grandmaster Kim Soo) didn't know why they changed the forms, but he was later told by one of his junior friends - who was secretary general of the WTF.

Major actions by individuals are not the basis of the development of the KMAs, eh? :lfao:

And please, let's not have any whinging about how negative all this is, and how I and others who actually do have some respect for what really did happen are just looking for things to gripe about. This is what happened, and the evidence is in the historical record. That's the first thing. The Korean TKD directorate would just as soon no one knew this stuff. That's the second thing. If anyone sees negativity here, don't complain to us—we're just the messenger. Savvy?

MBuzzy

01-13-2009, 09:37 PM

In 50 years, no one will know who the Kwan leaders were, just like no one now knows who did what to contribute to Korean martial arts from 200 years ago.

Wow....that is a pretty dim view of our world. I really can't see us going back into the dark ages. You realize that we now in the Information age. We are storing, cataloging and analyzing more data and information now than ever. The world is information oriented. We now live in a world where history and information is no longer simply "lost." We can keep it forever, there doesn't have to be a trade-off. I am wondering where this opinion comes from?

As I said before, Koreans see their martial arts history as as integrated whole, not compartmentalized into specific systems created by specific people a la Japanese karate. As such, who did what is not important, and one person cannot take credit for the art as a whole. This is something, I believe, many people have a hard time with. They want to give specific people credit for specific things, and Korean martial arts don't work like that.

While I do agree with the statement that these arts - especially the ones that have evolved considerably do not owe everything to their founders - they do owe something. NOTHING gets to where it is without its founder.

I wonder where this idea and opinion on Koreans is coming from? You made a comment directed at how Koreans view their history....but where did this come from? Is this from personal experience or from word of mouth?

I only ask because first of all, I am involved in a traditional Korean Martial Art that is VERY VERY respectful and reverent to its founder. In fact, EVERY Soo Bahk Do school has a photo of the founder AND his son in the Dojang. This is true of other Korean Martial arts who do pay homage to their founders.

Second, I lived in Korea for a year and traveled extensively and I got a completely opposite impression of Koreans and their view of history. They really don't seem to view things any differently than we do....except that they are MUCH more reverent and respectful of history, their elders and their ancestors. How many Americans still visit the graves of ancesters even from a generation ago? Most Koreans visit the grave sites of their ancestors for many generations back. I visited one burial mound that contained the remains of Koreans from before America existed....and those family member still visited....

rmclain

01-14-2009, 09:38 AM

Knowing the lineage and history can be self-defense against many nuts in the Korean martial arts making false claims - businessmen who have little to no martial arts experience that simply want to make money from an ignorant prospective or current student.

Knowing the history won't make you a better technician at martial arts, but it can protect you and your family from enrolling with one of the nuts listed above. There were quite a few of these with the wave of Korean TKD instructors that flooded America. Not everyone that has slanted eyes is a martial artist or instructor.

R. McLain

Miles

01-14-2009, 08:10 PM

So far as I know, not one of the Kwan founders studied in Okinawa; rather, they studied with Okinwan expats in Japan, where the Okinawan material had already been substantially changed, and diluted.

My apologies to Exile for the delayed response. I found this passage in Cook's "Shotokan, A Precise History" in the chapter entitled " The Rebirth of Shotokan" (P171):
"By the time of Gichin Funakoshi's death it is clear that the type of karate promoted by the JKA was regarded as purely Japanese in feel and content.

The Okinawan roots had been left far behind and, in the opinion of at least some of the JKA seniors, Okinawan karate was not perceived to contain anything of value. They were confident that the original Okinawan methods introduced by Funakoshi had been considerably improved upon by his Japanese followers, and there was nothing to be gained by investigating Okinawan karate systems. Masatomo Takagi, with a confidence verging on arrogance, observed in 1960 that "We (the JKA) studied Okinawan karate, but found that it lacked.....theory."

On page 167 of the same book, the author states that in the 1958 edition of "Karate Do Kyohan" Funakoshi, "comments unfavorably on the decline on the level of technique during the immediate post-war years. Funakoshi was aware that the physical practice of karate is subject to change, and he was not too concerned about changes in technique or using Japanese terms for the kaa in place of the older Okinawan names, thes are the natural changes and therefore acceptable.. He wrote in 1943:"since Karate is ever-advancing it is no longer possible to speak of the karate of today and the karate of a decade ago in the same breath. Accordingly, even fewer realize that karate in Tokyo today (i.e. 1943) is almost completely different in form from what was earlier practiced in Okinawa."

I don't think Funakoshi diluted anything from what he learned on Okinawa. I think it is clear that after his death in 1957, the JKA seniors consciously changed what they (and several of the Kwan founders) had learned from Funakoshi.

Again, sorry for the delayed response.

exile

01-14-2009, 09:18 PM

My apologies to Exile for the delayed response. I found this passage in Cook's "Shotokan, A Precise History" in the chapter entitled " The Rebirth of Shotokan" (P171):
"By the time of Gichin Funakoshi's death it is clear that the type of karate promoted by the JKA was regarded as purely Japanese in feel and content.

The Okinawan roots had been left far behind and, in the opinion of at least some of the JKA seniors, Okinawan karate was not perceived to contain anything of value. They were confident that the original Okinawan methods introduced by Funakoshi had been considerably improved upon by his Japanese followers, and there was nothing to be gained by investigating Okinawan karate systems. Masatomo Takagi, with a confidence verging on arrogance, observed in 1960 that "We (the JKA) studied Okinawan karate, but found that it lacked.....theory."

On page 167 of the same book, the author states that in the 1958 edition of "Karate Do Kyohan" Funakoshi, "comments unfavorably on the decline on the level of technique during the immediate post-war years. Funakoshi was aware that the physical practice of karate is subject to change, and he was not too concerned about changes in technique or using Japanese terms for the kaa in place of the older Okinawan names, thes are the natural changes and therefore acceptable.. He wrote in 1943:"since Karate is ever-advancing it is no longer possible to speak of the karate of today and the karate of a decade ago in the same breath. Accordingly, even fewer realize that karate in Tokyo today (i.e. 1943) is almost completely different in form from what was earlier practiced in Okinawa."

I don't think Funakoshi diluted anything from what he learned on Okinawa. I think it is clear that after his death in 1957, the JKA seniors consciously changed what they (and several of the Kwan founders) had learned from Funakoshi.

Again, sorry for the delayed response.

No problem, Miles, I have that happen to me all the time... all this damned pesky stuff people insist on calling 'Real Life' getting in the way! :D

As far as GF's relation to Okinawan praxis is concerned: I wouldn't disagree for a second that those after Funakoshi diluted the material he taught considerably. But that doesn't mean that GF himself was faithful either to the content or the curriculum of what he himself had learned in Okinawa. Consider the following, from Gennosuke Higake's excellent book Hidden Karate: the True Bunkai for the Heian Katas and Naihanchi—that, as he was told by Shozan Kubota, one of the last of Gichin Funakoshi's senior students (4th Dan from GF, 1944), discussing what he calls the `secret pact' between GF and the other Okinawan expat instructors, on the one hand, and the senior Karateka then alive in Okinawa, to the effect that the former would not teach the true bunkai for the kata they taught. As he writes (pp.65–66), Sensei Kubota told him that

When Master Gichin Funakoshi introduced Okinawan karate to the mainland, there was a `secret pact' made amongst the practitioners of Okinawan karate. Karate was primarily spread at universities, and the explanation, which Sensei Kubota learned, was about the same as today.

It was, however, completely different than what he was taught at night by Master Funakoshi at his house. When asked, `Why did he teach something different than in the day time?', his answer was that `Master Funakoshi was actually not suppose to teach it.'

In other words... when he taught his ordinary students [`yomatonchu' (the slang for Japanese mainlanders)], he taught them katas, which they would not be able to use.

Sensei Kubota also learned from Master Kenwa Mabuni. Master Mabuni also divided the teaching into `the original form' and `the other form'.... There is a well-known saying in karate that goes, `Even if you teach the kata, don't teach the actual techniques'. I believe this phrase expresses well the contents of the `secret pact'.

It's clear from the discussion in Higaki's book that what was involved was not something formal, but more of a gentleman's agreement: yes, you can go to Japan and set up shop, but you are not to show them what we showed you. There were a number of reasons for this, and clearly—as one might expect—GF slipped up a bit with his virtuoso students, like Shozan Kubota. But the point is that the Okinawan expats were prepared to go only so far in sharing their knowledge. And really, Miles, how could it be otherwise? If you're doing mass instruction with people who are learning it for radically different reasons than it was originally developed for, as vs. very small classes with a few very long-time students whom you know well and are willing to teach dangerous techs to for actual combat (not what the Japanese education authorities were interested in)... how could you possibly teach them the same stuff? How could you give them the same kind of individual attention, work on the same kind of one-on-one techs, all the stuff that people did in the much smaller, semi-improvised context of the Okinawan dojo? Willy-nilly, it's got to be very different, simply because the conditions are so different. Throw in the extreme ambivalence of the Okinawans towards their racially condescending hosts (something that Higaki goes into serious detail about) and loyalty to old teachers... and what Higaki reports about Shozan Kubota and the other Japanese students of the Okinawan expats makes absolutely perfect, inevitable sense.

Miles

01-14-2009, 09:23 PM

Exile, I will have to expand my library.

Thanks for the discussion!

arnisador

01-14-2009, 09:59 PM

The conspiracy implicit in the 'dilution' theory is plausible to me, particularly since I strongly favour the Okinwan systems over their Japanese relations, but I also wonder if it's like when people say an animal has evolved to a 'higher' form, as though that was the teleological goal, rather than emphasizing it has evolved to a different form that is better suited to some purpose. Maybe it was purposefully diluted--which assumes that there really are secrets in the arts, something I largely doubt--or maybe, as I suspect is more likely, Funakoshi Gichin was willing to modify it to fit the Japanese "one strike, one kill"/"more power" mindset and preference for larger motions and stances, and that he elected not to fight them when they said some of his techniques and training methods were archaic or tedious or overly intricate.

tellner

01-14-2009, 10:00 PM

Ah, so el plato gringo isn't just for Europeans.

chrispillertkd

01-14-2009, 10:03 PM

... followed, ironically, by a similar fate for Gen. Choi as a result of his ill-advised trip North, playing into his many enemies' hands, chief among them the nasty dictator Gen. Park, who had deposed the nasty dictator Rhee. Just as had happened with Hwang Kee, Gen. Choi went into exile, establishing a distinctive TKD style which minimized the sport competitive element glorified by the TKDeaucrats of the WTF/KKW who superseded him.

Exile, thanks for an excellent post which makes some very good points. I just want to point out, however, that the above statement about Gen. Choi is not correct. He went into exile in 1972 not as a result of visiting the DPRK but rather because he was rather outspoken in his criticisms of President Park, Chung Hee (a man he court martialed and sentenced to death when they were in the military together).

Gen. Choi did not visit North Korea until 1979 or 1980 to visit his older brother. In 1981 he led a demonstration team to the DPRK and in 1982 he sent then-Master Park, Jung Tae to North Korea to lead a 7 month long instructors course.

Just a few historical details for a thread devoted to Taekwon-Do history :)

Pax,

Chris

exile

01-14-2009, 10:15 PM

Exile, I will have to expand my library.

Thanks for the discussion!

You're more than welcome, and thanks to you, for the same! Higaki's book is really good, very interesting both for its own 'take' on the Heian/Pinan katas (and some outstanding photos of early karate masters in serious combat-style sparring) and for the fact that, so far as I know, it's the first of the new-wave realistic detailed bunkai analyses to be offered by a Japanese karateka. Mostly those people are from the UK, with a few in the US and Australia. So his book is of more than usual interest.

The conspiracy implicit in the 'dilution' theory is plausible to me, particularly since I strongly favour the Okinwan systems over their Japanese relations, but I also wonder if it's like when people say an animal has evolved to a 'higher' form, as though that was the teleological goal, rather than emphasizing it has evolved to a different form that is better suited to some purpose. Maybe it was purposefully diluted--which assumes that there really are secrets in the arts, something I largely doubt--or maybe, as I suspect is more likely, Funakoshi Gichin was willing to modify it to fit the Japanese "one strike, one kill"/"more power" mindset and preference for larger motions and stances, and that he elected not to fight them when they said some of his techniques and training methods were archaic or tedious or overly intricate.

This could well be exactly right: GF really, over his lifetime, blew with the prevailing wind. In spite of his Okinawan origins and ambivalence about the Japanese, he played to Japanese militarism before the war (certain of his statements are actually pretty horrifying in this respect), to the American occupiers' sensibilities afterward, and basically did what he needed to do to continue doing what he wanted to do. He probably did modify his Okinawan training in a way that would make it more digestible, or intelligible, to his Japanese students; and I agree, the considerable cultural differences between the mainland Japanese and the people of the Ryukus would have been something he would have taken into account in his teaching, given that accomodating his hosts was something he did consistently from the time he resettled in Japan...

Makalakumu

01-15-2009, 01:30 AM

When writing his autobiography, Karate Do, My Way of Life, Gichin Funakoshi recounts the losses everyone suffered because of Japanese militarism and you get the impression that he felt remorse in training so many young men to die.

StuartA

01-15-2009, 04:45 AM

The Okinawan roots had been left far behind and, in the opinion of at least some of the JKA seniors, Okinawan karate was not perceived to contain anything of value. They were confident that the original Okinawan methods introduced by Funakoshi had been considerably improved upon by his Japanese followers, and there was nothing to be gained by investigating Okinawan karate systems. Masatomo Takagi, with a confidence verging on arrogance, observed in 1960 that "We (the JKA) studied Okinawan karate, but found that it lacked.....theory."

And so it comes full circle with TKD, with some fairly high ranking people saying the same thing about TKD, its patterns applications not listed in the encys and its roots in Shotokan.

Funny how things tend to repeat themselves eh!

Stuart

Miles

01-15-2009, 08:28 AM

And so it comes full circle with TKD, with some fairly high ranking people saying the same thing about TKD, its patterns applications not listed in the encys and its roots in Shotokan.

Funny how things tend to repeat themselves eh!

Stuart

True Stuart, ironic is it not?

exile

01-15-2009, 11:19 AM

Exile, thanks for an excellent post which makes some very good points. I just want to point out, however, that the above statement about Gen. Choi is not correct. He went into exile in 1972 not as a result of visiting the DPRK but rather because he was rather outspoken in his criticisms of President Park, Chung Hee (a man he court martialed and sentenced to death when they were in the military together).

Gen. Choi did not visit North Korea until 1979 or 1980 to visit his older brother. In 1981 he led a demonstration team to the DPRK and in 1982 he sent then-Master Park, Jung Tae to North Korea to lead a 7 month long instructors course.

Just a few historical details for a thread devoted to Taekwon-Do history :)

Pax,

Chris

Thanks for the correction, Chris. And thanks mucho for that bolded bit of info about Choi and Park... wow, I knew that there was no love lost between those two, but I hadn't realized it was that... serious. :erg:

IcemanSK

01-15-2009, 01:25 PM

I see this discussion & debate & I don't see the history or the Art that we all love going away anytime soon.

As long as we pass it on to the next generation, it will continue.

StuartA

01-15-2009, 02:17 PM

I see this discussion & debate & I don't see the history or the Art that we all love going away anytime soon.

As long as we pass it on to the next generation, it will continue.

Depends whats passed on really.. the true history or the false history! I bet the KKW was hoping it (the true history) had all been long forgotten by now, over shadowed by numerous repeats of the false history.. then along comes O'Neil & Gillis :shooter: LOL

Stuart

chrispillertkd

01-15-2009, 02:20 PM

Thanks for the correction, Chris. And thanks mucho for that bolded bit of info about Choi and Park... wow, I knew that there was no love lost between those two, but I hadn't realized it was that... serious. :erg:

Yeah, sometimes I wonder why Gen. Choi waited so long to leave Korea, all things considered. Personally, I imagine part of the reason was that he was able to hang on to a good portion of his political influence even though Park forced him to retire from the military. Of course, getting out of the country was not exactly easy, at the time. I think it's important for people to have a good understanding of exactly what was going down in Korea and the nature of the political milieu the main players in Taekwon-Do's history had to navigate. Gives things a bit of a different perspective, at times.

I imagine the decommisioning of the 29th infantry division was an attempt by Park to curtail Choi's influence (since the soldiers once directly under his command would be dispersed throughout other divisions and, hence, less likely to support a Choi-led coup). This is pure speculation on my part, but I think it's at least possible. Making Gen. Choi an ambassador was a neat way to get him out of the country and thus decrease is influence, too. As I said, this is all speculation on my part. But those certainly were interesting times, no?

Pax,

Chris