History and Traditions

Karate is not, as some are led to believe, a traditionally Japanese martial art but rather its origins lay in the small island of Okinawa situated off the south coast of Japan. Its development lay in the island’s history of continuous invasion, its major occupation being the Japanese shogun rule from 1609 until the mid-nineteenth century. During this time the Okinawans, including their puppet royalty, were not allowed to bear arms and so they had to rely on various forms of unarmed combat for defensive purposes. Influences primarily came from China, where the Okinawan upper classes were sent to study, and so various Kungfu and Chinese boxing styles were practised, most notably White Crane. These were further refined and developed during the first part of the nineteenth century to create techniques that were efficient and based upon generating power thought speed rather than relying on strength to work.

The main influential people involved in Karate’s development were Sakukawa Kanga (1782 to 1838) who taught Matsumara Sokon (1809 to 1899), the man whose style went onto become Shorin-ryu. He was also the man who developed the idea of generating power through speed and body technique to make his style resemble the Karate practised today. His students included Itosu Anko (1831 to 1915) and Azato, who both helped to further develop the Kata that is so important to Karate training. These two men were also the teachers of Gichin Funakoshi, who was instrumental to Shotokan Karate and helped to introduce Karate to Japan.

However, there are other styles of Karate, as these developed from the various different towns in Okinawa. These include Shotokan, Wado-ryu, Gojo-ryu, Uechi-ryu and Kiokoshinkai, a full-contact version of Karate, amongst others. Each has its own lineage and masters, with its own distinct focus and style such as close-up fighting and kata.

Training and Principles

Karate is a fully rounded traditional martial art that is based upon the rank system via colour belts for the junior or Kyu grades and black belt grades for the senior Dan grades. Practitioners of Karate are known as Karateka, their training hall is known as a dojo and their, often white, uniform is known as a gi.

The main parts of training include Kihon, which are the basic techniques that are repeated by drilling up and down the dojo, often known as floor work. However, the mainstay of Karate training is based around the Kata, otherwise known as ‘forms’. The Kata are a prearranged sequence of movements that include both defence and counter-attacks against an imaginary series of opponents. They start with basic Kata for the beginning students and increase in difficulty as the student moves up the grades, often with their having to demonstrate their proficiency in a particular Kata for a particular grade. These Kata often include deep stances to help develop the karateka’s leg strength and large body movements to help train for upper body power and cardio fitness. They also serve to help develop the karateka’s memory and ability to multi task as some of the Katas are complex and lengthy, thus aiding them to think under physical pressure.

There is free-sparring included in most syllabuses, known as Kumite. This did not develop until later, after the Second World War. Funakoshi was not keen on the idea as Karate practised for sport but nonetheless, it started to develop in the 1940s. The Kumite can vary from style to style; from no contact to full contact but serves as a both a sport and as self-defence training. Sparring matches are often organised via gender, age and weight divisions and international competition is highly organised, often by the World Karate Federation. Karate has been considered as an Olympic sport in the past but has not yet been fully approved. This could change though.

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