Right, is Ju Jitsu the last bastion of true 'street' combative arts. I've heard this being said over the last few weeks. And coming from a mostly Tai Jitsu background I'm interested in what people have to say. Thanx
I do not believe that it is at all. I am training Hapkido now and we train for combat in the real world. I believe Bujinkan, most Aikido schools, and a few others arts to be combative as well. Rob
It's not so much the "style" or the name given to the art as the way it is trained. Jujitsu can still be ineffective if taught wrong. I do karate, it is combatitive, but I acknowledge that the majority of what is being taught as "karate" is not. Also depends on what you mean by 'street' are you talking self-defence or one-on-one challenges that happen to occur on the street? If you let weapons in you get different answers. I also teach Kobudo, I won't try and say that it is directly applicable to street fighting, but I can say that after you've learned enough weapons you become pretty comfortable improvising when you can't get the one you REALLY want. So the answer to your question is... it depends on how its being taught and how your practicing it.
'It's not so much the "style" or the name given to the art as the way it is trained.' Thats what I've been saying for years. Alot of Karate is put down as 'not effective' because people have lost a lot of information (which is all stored in the kata anyway). What I'm seeing a lot of in Ju Jitsu these days is a lot of people walking around saying 'ours is the most effective because we train in all ranges'. What we seem to be losing these days is a lot of information that is actually contained in our styles, there is atemi-waza kata in Judo, grappling technques in karate why has this information been lost. Maybe I should rephrase my original question and ask if Ju Jitsu is the last multi-range style that retains 'most' of its original techniques. Thanx
I can try and answer that if you want, but it will be long No, Jujitsu is not, there are still some of us karate folk that still know how to tie people in knots. Some schools of Aikido do to from what I understand. It could be argued that Hapkido is in there. Its really a school dependant thing not a style dependant thing. There are also a lot of Jujitsu folk that couldn't strike there way out of a wet paper bag. As far as all ranges, Mixed Martial Arts does that, they miss other things but can fight on their feet and on the ground. Jujitsu is the best = Good advertising and propaganda, not really something intrinsically contained within jujitsu. The reason is there focus, more jujitsu schools tend to be focused on self-defence over other things.
Tell that to Kancho Bill Cox UK or Kancho Gary Scotland of spirit combat Ju jitsu isnt the be end and end all of things but like all martial arts it helps
One of my pet hates is the term Mixed Martial Arts (MMA). In my view (if none of you had guessed by now) matial arts is exactly that 'MARTIAL'. You could equate ranges to military forces, kicking and punching could be your air force because of its long reach, the army could be your grappling because its messy (yes I'm a grappler as well, and yes it is messy), and I've got no comment on the Navy . Anyway my point is that you wouldn't get a country that had just one (or none if your swiss), it would give them an exploitable weakness, in 'Traditional Styles' all ranges were taught and this whole MMA thing seems to have forgotten that and view 'cross-training' as something new. Thanx p.s Andrew if you are willing to tell why we've lost so much information from our katas I'd like to hear, maybe you could start a thread over in Karate (pretty please ).
Messy grapplers? More years ago than I care to recall, I studied Kodokan Judo. (No, this isn't one of those "In my day we walked 10 miles barefooted to school..." stories). The curriculum was very standardized. At first one developed legs of a nice purple colour as sempai (advanced students) used one for sweeps and clips. Then one moved on to overall body contusions learning to breakfall, so that sempai could practice their throws. After about a year, one advanced into matburns as sempai worked on chokes, and other matwork. You didn't need to look at belts to tell rank, you could 'read' the injuries. Sometime during the 70's, matwork started to fade from the curriculum. No one wanted to get all dirty and sweaty and scraped up on 'traditional' stuff that wasn't practical, and besides, there was the new Olympic Judo, so why not spend your time in the dojo practicing koka (almost a quarter of a point) tactics to win matches? Fast forward to the nineties, and am I surprised to see parking lots full of Volvo wagons, as people pay hundreds of dollars to learn 'grappling' at seminars, because their art needs to be more versatile? I am not criticizing grapplers, who know what they are doing, or those who enjoy practicing Judo, of either stripe. I am echoing the above point, that a complete art may already have grappling, etc. in it. Sometimes we are re-inventing the wheel. paul
Grapplers Pablo, Are you saying that modern day judo is more about the sport aspect of the art and may have lost it's original direction. Personally ....if a judo bloke got a hold of me ..i think i would be in a world of hurt ..even more so if it was a ju-jitsu bloke. So i'll stand at a distance and pick them off(maybe call names and throw stones ) but you get my drift. regards fraser
I'm saying that I've met Judo people who spent money to go to a grappling seminar, Karate people who spent money to go to a pressure point seminar, Aikido people who went to a weapons seminar, and Taiji people who went to a combatives seminar. Somewhere along the way, the systems that they trained in once had the exact same infomation that these folks were now paying to get elsewhere. It was just an observation, and I am sure that there are some people out there from each of the above styles who can demonstrate the full range of their art. I am equally sure that there are plenty who cannot, which is probably why there is such a market for 'mixed' or eclectic arts. In terms of what 'A Judo' person could or couldn't do, I favor the 80/20 rule. In the MA, as in life, 20 percent of the people have 80 percent of the knowledge. 80 percent of the people know 20 percent of the stuff. The trick is keeping those 20 percent on your good side.
I have theory to do with this, a master i know of - a master of more than one style, several striking styles i.e:TKD/kempo and also judo/ju jitsu grappling styles. Yet the style he now promotes is mostly striking, which is obviously what he preferes. the knowledge he has about grappling and such is locked in his head - he doesn't use it because of his size and doesn't think its relative, so he doesn't teach it. That knowledge is now lost, this is quite likely what happened to all these other arts - masters just prefered to teach one aspect of an art 'cause it suited them best. Any thoughts?
So whats the moral of the story here?? Have we come to the conclusion that a good club(if not style) will cover all general areas of martial arts, even if they do concentrate only in some. This may be the only way to become a good “mixed martial artist” as so many clubs are against sharing knowledge. An instructor once told me to always train on your weakest points. Sounds a good tip to be a good all rounder as long as it doesn’t have any impact on your strong points, ie the strengths that make your style effective. ps Hope I’ve not offended anyone by using the term mixed martial artist, maybe I should have said a good all rounder or not weak in any areas, there more politically correct statements.
It should be the responsibility of an Instructor to pass on the necessary knowledge to his students. Just because you favor on range doesn't mean you shouldn't practice the other, even if your exceptionally good (theres always someone better). An Instructor should identify a students weak & strong points and guide them into the right direction. Thanx
This is so true. An instructor should also seek out any relevent knowledge from any other source (even if that means going to a rival art) and then pass that on too. An instructor can also learn new techniques along side his/her students - why not? Anyone disagree? What do you think people?
I definitely agree. The only thing that can never be taken away is knowledge. The one thing that I think should be concentrated on most in life, be it training or just in general, should be learning from everything that is done or seen. Rob
But surely we're all brothers/sisters in Martial Arts In the Tai Jitsu school I'm part of, when your at a Senior level and want to learn say weapons, your Instructor may say 'Well I'm good but you should go and see XXXX he's much better than me' and that guy may say to his students 'Oh, you want to learn groundfighting, go see Col, he's better at it than I am'. Bearing in mind that all the Instructors a very good in each area but for 'advanced' study are willing to send their Senior students to other Instructors to learn, this is a good system I find as I'm sure you'll agree you can't be a Master in all Arenas. Thanx
"rival" - i meant rival as in rival for clients, nothing else. I had a feeling somebody might pick up on that, but thanks for being gentle with me. LOL
