# Korean MA evolution



## terryl965 (Sep 5, 2006)

Why have we not seen more evolution in the Korean Arts over the last 10 years, has it become more of a sport and no room to go, or has the higher ups in the Arts of Korea just have become complacent in there ways.

Are the younger student in your eyes doing anything to keep the Koreans Arts in the forefront or is time passing us by?

Terry


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## exile (Sep 13, 2006)

>Why have we not seen more evolution in the Korean Arts over the last 10 >years, has it become more of a sport and no room to go, or has the higher >ups in the Arts of Korea just have become complacent in there ways.

Terry, I don't know if this is the sort of response you had in mind. But so far as the `flagship' Korean art, TKD, is concerned, can you think of any other MA on the planet whose technical content is in effect centrally controlled by a national government? 

Where else have a set of fundamental forms, such as the pyang-ahn hyungs  (=  the pinan katas of Okinawan karate, the foundation and first ten storeys of TKD) been dropped from the curriculum by central fiat? And in part replaced by a set of forms---the Palgwes---subsequently deemed still `too Japanese', and so in turn dropped in favor of the Taegeuks? I'm not knocking the Taegeuks---their content is still closely linked with the classical Okinawan forms and maintain, though a little bit distantly, the connection to the Okinawan/Japanese MAs that were the source of TKD. What I'm talking about is the effect of bureaucratic control over a (martial) art form. How can it be good??? Fine, the Korean governments wants TKD to be a recognizable and highly desirable `brand' and relentlessly pursues Olympic recognition till it succeeds in getting it---but how does that help advance TKD as an evolving *combat* art? Most people who study a martial art, I would bet, don't have any competitive ambitions; they're much more likely to want be able to defend themselves should they ever have to. And yet, if they find themselves in a WTF dojang---which the great majority will, I suspect---they are going to be looking at a curriculum which is set by a centralized sports bureaucracy and its Olympic-level agenda.

 And if the highest-profile martial art of a particular country is so rigidly controlled, what is the effect going to be on the other, much more local-scale MAs of that country?

>Are the younger student in your eyes doing anything to keep the Koreans >Arts in the forefront or is time passing us by?

Well, time is always passing us by, no? I think the best we can hope for is that the pendulum will swing the other way, after a while. My fantasy about TKD is that 20 years down the road, TKD will no longer be an Olympic sport, will no longer have a single national organization enforcing its curriculum, but will have reverted to the kwan-level organization it had in the middle of the 20th century, with plenty of free experimentation and a heavy focus on combat applications, martial efficacy---`what works', as they say. But I don't see that happening as long as TKD is an instrument of Korean national policy...


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## exile (Sep 13, 2006)

Just a PS: yes, I know the official line about the Palgwes is that they were dropped because they didn't represent a joint product of *all* the kwans. But there seems to be a lot of agreement that the Palgwes are much more similar to the overall style of Japanese karate katas than the Taegeuks are---the stances are much lower and the sequences incorporate whole chunks of material from those katas; the Palgwes incorporate kicking moves to a much lower degree than the Taegeuks (again, throwing them in with Japanese karate katas in the comparison), and so on. So it seems pretty plausible to me that the difficulty posed by the Palgwes is that they weren't sufficiently differentiated from the Okinawan/Japanese roots of TKD...


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## rmclain (Sep 14, 2006)

exile said:


> Just a PS: yes, I know the official line about the Palgwes is that they were dropped because they didn't represent a joint product of *all* the kwans. But there seems to be a lot of agreement that the Palgwes are much more similar to the overall style of Japanese karate katas than the Taegeuks are---the stances are much lower and the sequences incorporate whole chunks of material from those katas; the Palgwes incorporate kicking moves to a much lower degree than the Taegeuks (again, throwing them in with Japanese karate katas in the comparison), and so on. So it seems pretty plausible to me that the difficulty posed by the Palgwes is that they weren't sufficiently differentiated from the Okinawan/Japanese roots of TKD...


 

The Bureaucratic well goes deeper than the similarity of the Palgue forms to karate forms. 

 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.

About the kwans:  The kwans were already dissolved before 1970.  They weren't supposed to use their name after around 1965 (I can look this up in an interview, but I forget the exact year in the 1960's).  Instead they were supposed to respond to role-call numbers.  No Kwan name anymore.

R. McLain


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## exile (Sep 14, 2006)

rmclain said:


> The Bureaucratic well goes deeper than the similarity of the Palgue forms to karate forms.
> 
> 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.



Wow... I was going to write something like, `can you believe the *smallness* of the people who did that?'---but then I thought a bit more about it and found that I could believe it with no trouble at all. Rejecting the Palgwes on the basis of aroused Korean nationalism after the occupation would have been one thing---a mistake, but an understandable one---but the *pettiness* of what you've described... it's breathtaking. And absolutely typical of the deadening culture of bureaucratic structures.



> The first book on Paglue forms in "Palgue 1-2-3 of TaeKwondo Hyung," by Kim Soo.  Ohara Publications, 1973.[\QUOTE]
> 
> Robert, thanks for this information. I feel almost honor bound now to order the book, after the number Grandmaster Kim's colleagues pulled on him.
> 
> ...


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## Miles (Sep 15, 2006)

terryl965 said:


> Why have we not seen more evolution in the Korean Arts over the last 10 years, has it become more of a sport and no room to go, or has the higher ups in the Arts of Korea just have become complacent in there ways.
> 
> Are the younger student in your eyes doing anything to keep the Koreans Arts in the forefront or is time passing us by?
> 
> Terry



It may just be me, but I think the KMA have "evolved" quite a bit from their original Korean/Japanese/Okinawan/Chinese influences.   No longer is what we do Korean Karate or Korean Kung-fu, it is something similar but wonderfully different.

I also think that having a sport aspect to Taekwondo means that there will continue to be evolution as coaches and players learn more about the human body and how to deliver stronger and faster techniques. 

It is all good!

Miles


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## Miles (Sep 15, 2006)

exile said:


> But so far as the `flagship' Korean art, TKD, is concerned, can you think of any other MA on the planet whose technical content is in effect centrally controlled by a national government?
> ......... What I'm talking about is the effect of bureaucratic control over a (martial) art form. How can it be good??? Fine, the Korean governments wants TKD to be a recognizable and highly desirable `brand' and relentlessly pursues Olympic recognition till it succeeds in getting it---but how does that help advance TKD as an evolving *combat* art? Most people who study a martial art, I would bet, don't have any competitive ambitions; they're much more likely to want be able to defend themselves should they ever have to. And yet, if they find themselves in a WTF dojang---which the great majority will, I suspect---they are going to be looking at a curriculum which is set by a centralized sports bureaucracy and its Olympic-level agenda.




Exile, the Kukkiwon is a private corporation recognized by the Korean government.  It is run by martial artists for martial arts purposes.  It's stated goal is to certify black belt ranks and instructors.  How can it do so if there is not a structure, a standardized curriculum?

As far as I know, only in Korea is an instructor required to be certified as such by Kukkiwon in order to open a dojang.  That's more of a quality-control requirement, much like only graduates from ABA-accredited law schools can sit for the bar exam to become lawyers.  

The Kukkiwon curriculum, if you will, essentially gives minimal requirements for dan rank advancement.  What an instructor teaches in his/her dojang is still up to that instructor.  

I agree that the overwhelming majority of Taekwondo students are not interested in competition.  That again is one of the beautiful aspects of Taekwondo-you can train for life.

As far as Robert's claims that the entire Palgwe series was scrapped because his instructor published a book in English, well, this is the first I've heard of it.  I guess I tend to stick with the "official party line" about the need for inclusion of the Moo Duk Kwan and Jidokwan input into the poomsae, the heart of the art.

Miles


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## exile (Sep 16, 2006)

Miles said:


> It may just be me, but I think the KMA have "evolved" quite a bit from their original Korean/Japanese/Okinawan/Chinese influences.   No longer is what we do Korean Karate or Korean Kung-fu, it is something similar but wonderfully different.
> 
> I also think that having a sport aspect to Taekwondo means that there will continue to be evolution as coaches and players learn more about the human body and how to deliver stronger and faster techniques.
> 
> ...



Sigh. This is probably a disagreement that I probably don't want to get into. But I believe that what the evolution you refer to has occured largely under the pressure of the sport aspect, and the `stronger/faster' techniques you refer to are only those specifically adapted to Olympic TKD as promoted by the WTF. The scoring system virtually guarantees that the primary focus of modern TKD involves minimal use of hand techniques, not just the Itosu-coded `blocks and punches' but the combat sources of those moves---the use of muchimi to establish locks and the application of those locks to set up maximally damaging strikes to vital point on the head; throws setting up low joint-destruction kicks to the knee, and all the rest of it---the full combat art that the Korean masters brought over from those Okinawan/Japanese/Chinese arts you referred to. Just how much of that material is supported by the kind of emphasis on sport techniques involving the current almost arbitrary scoring system which reward high kicks to the head---about the worst possible self-defense technique imaginable? Miles, we've both watched a zillion tournament matches either in person or on TV or video---are you really going to maintain that what takes place in an Olympic-format ring represents any kind of progress in terms of TKD as a self-defense system? 

I'm aware that evolution doesn't necessarily correspond to progress. But what have we actually gained by having the primary focus of the art, the `hook', i.e. competitive sport TKD, take a form in which an earlier effective repretoire of fighting techniques has become pared down to what you see in so many TKD ring matches, where the competitors often don't even keep their hands up to defend their centerlines? You've described this development as `wonderful', but what is wonderful about it? Anticipating what you say in your next post, yes, instructors are free to add on to the basic (sports-TDK) driven curriculum, but how many have themselves trained in the kind of bunkai-jutsu version of TKD---the really hard combat style promoted in the UK by Abernethy and his colleagues in karate  and by Simon O'Neil in TKD---so they can teach it to their students? The karate people, I keep hearing, figure that the growth of sports karate has diluted the combat applications of that MA a great deal over the past severaldecades (look at some of the threads over in there), and the same thing has happened in TKD. Why is that a good thing?


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## Jonathan Randall (Sep 16, 2006)

exile said:


> Well, time is always passing us by, no? I think the best we can hope for is that the pendulum will swing the other way, after a while. My fantasy about TKD is that 20 years down the road, TKD will no longer be an Olympic sport, will no longer have a single national organization enforcing its curriculum, but will have reverted to the kwan-level organization it had in the middle of the 20th century, with plenty of free experimentation and a heavy focus on combat applications, martial efficacy---`what works', as they say. But I don't see that happening as long as TKD is an instrument of Korean national policy...


 
I too miss those years. There was a time when TKD stylists kept their guard up, knew how to throw and fall _and_ had some idea of what to do once they got on the ground, could throw reverse punches and front kicks with a snap and power that would have made any JKA expert proud, etc.

I'm afraid, IMO, the evolution of KMA, TKD particularly, has not been very positive.


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## Last Fearner (Sep 16, 2006)

Master Stoker, here are my answers to your highly pertinent questions.



terryl965 said:


> Why have we not seen more evolution in the Korean Arts over the last 10 years,...


There has, of course, been evolution to Taekwondo recently, but as you ask why we have not seen *more* evolution, I say it depends on where you look.  There are schools, and instructors who are becoming one-dimensional with their focus on sports, or learning a small fraction of what Taekwondo really is, from a poor source, and then lumping that in with other training to claim some enhanced program under "Mixed Martial Art."  It is unfortunate that there are not enough thoroughly trained Masters for the majority of students to learn about the complete package of what Taekwondo has to offer all by itself.



terryl965 said:


> ... has it become more of a sport and no room to go, or has the higher ups in the Arts of Korea just have become complacent in there ways.


I think it is a shame when people begin to identify a Martial Art by its tournament aspect, or by the *forms* (kata, hyung, poomsae, tul) they use.  This is such a small, insignificant portion of the whole Martial Art that I don't see why people get so hung up on trying to "identify" the roots of Korean Taekwondo because the modern use of forms are patterned after something that was done in Karate or elsewhere.

That would be like saying a group of Full Blood Cherokee were not Native American's because they currently wear Levi jeans while attending their pow-wows (yes, that's the term they use).  Some of them might even like to dance to disco, or rock and roll.  That does not mean that the rest of their culture is not native to their people.  Forms do not make the Martial Art, nor define the entire arts origins. (period)



exile said:


> ...I'm not knocking the Taegeuks---their content is still closely linked with the classical Okinawan forms and maintain, though a little bit distantly, the connection to the Okinawan/Japanese MAs that were the source of TKD.


This is the exact kind of misleading statement that keeps each generation of new students (and some of the older ones) believing that Taekwondo came from Japanese Karate.  The fact is, post war instructors had been introduced to Japanese Martial Art, and it influenced their training.  General Choi, Hong Hi had learned Karate, and much of *his* own methods of teaching, and *his* Chang Hon forms were based on that knowledge.

The collection of Korean Martial Art, which eventually came to be called "Taekwondo" as a result of the 1955 meeting, is to represent the historical roots, and origins of Korean Martial Art (Subak, Taekyon, Hwarang-do, Hapkido, etc), which *did* exist long before the Japanese occupation.  The Korean Government's choice to use the term "Taekwondo" is not intended to represent the same thing that General Choi intended it to represent.



terryl965 said:


> ... Are the younger student in your eyes doing anything to keep the Koreans Arts in the forefront or is time passing us by?


The younger students look to us, the instructors, and senior Masters to teach them.  If not, they are foolishly trying to re-invent the wheel in their own life-time.  It is fine for them to gain the knowledge of the Masters, and then add modern influences, and adaptations.  This is the evolution that keeps any Art alive.  The core roots, and scientific principles will never change, but the surface is flexible to fit the circumstances, and changing times.

As instructors, we look to our seniors (if we are wise) and learn from their experiences, but we do not have to wait on the Koreans, or anyone else, to keep our training fresh, and current.  We decide what we teach in our own schools, above and beyond the required curriculum.  Thus, it is up to us if it evolves, stays current, and is useful in real self defense or not.



exile said:


> ...can you think of any other MA on the planet whose technical content is in effect centrally controlled by a national government?


As long as I have been around Taekwondo, I have never experienced any type of control over what I teach by the Korean Government.  Smaller organizations (ATA, ITF, etc.) tend to control what is taught more than the Kukkiwon or Korean Government.  Minimum standards only help to set guidelines and prevent low quality certification.  Taekwondo instructors, inside Korea as well as out, have always been able to teach whatever they want beyond the basics that are laid out in any curriculum established by the Kukkiwon.

The WTF is only used for competition guidelines, and has no control over the daily class, nor the reality and effectiveness of the self defense.  Yes, what is practiced for tournaments *can*, and typically *does*, enhance the athlete's ability to perform in real-life self defense situations - provided they round out their training with the full curriculum.  The two realms compliment each other.

Those who *only* train for the ring are the ones who create this false sense that Taekwondo is becoming a sport, and Tournament fighters do nothing that is useful in the street.  Both of those statements are false.  Taekwondo is *not* a sport (as a whole), but it can be used in sport form, therefore this aspect can be called the "sport of Taekwondo."  Competition skills do translate over to self defense *if* the connection is maintained between the rest of the training for reality.

The reasons for changing poomsae go way deeper than one man writing a book (although it is a contributing factor), and none of the decisions were petty, by any means.  We are talking about a nation of people who were oppressed, murdered, raped, and nearly absorbed into another culture.  Re-establishing Korean identity, language, history, and roots to *all* things in their past means everything to them.

Being secure from their northern brothers who attempted to over-take their freedom in 1950 is of high concern.  Making a stand in the global community, and appearing as a fully identifiable Korean nation who has a right to sit at the table with other world leaders is not a petty concern.  Economics, cultural pride, and survival drive decisions in most every nation.  Why should Korea be different?  Why should Koreans be criticized for wanting these things?  Taekwondo is as much a point of national pride to them, as baseball, American made cars, and Rock and Roll music is to Americans - - even more so!

There is good and bad in the development of Taekwondo through modern schools.  I don't care for anything to revert back to old times - - just preserve the foundations from Korean history (as it should be) and keep striving for perfection in our modern day practice, sports, instruction, and real-life application of genuine Korean Taekwondo.

Those are my thoughts on the subject.
CM D.J. Eisenhart


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## exile (Sep 16, 2006)

Last Fearner said:


> This is the exact kind of misleading statement that keeps each generation of new students (and some of the older ones) believing that Taekwondo came from Japanese Karate.  The fact is, post war instructors had been introduced to Japanese Martial Art, and it influenced their training.  General Choi, Hong Hi had learned Karate, and much of *his* own methods of teaching, and *his* Chang Hon forms were based on that knowledge.
> 
> The collection of Korean Martial Art, which eventually came to be called "Taekwondo" as a result of the 1955 meeting, is to represent the historical roots, and origins of Korean Martial Art (Subak, Taekyon, Hwarang-do, Hapkido, etc), which *did* exist long before the Japanese occupation.  The Korean Government's choice to use the term "Taekwondo" is not intended to represent the same thing that General Choi intended it to represent.



This passage makes it sound as if General Choi's training was the only source of the martial art that was packaged as TKD in the mid-fifites. But that's hardly the case. Simon O'Neil summarizes the extent of karate's influence on the backgrounds of the great masters who brought the _kwan_ system into being in the earlier part of the century:

_Lee Won Kuk of the Chung Do Kwan and Ro Pyong Chik of the Song Moo Kwan earned tehir black belts in Shotokan Karate under Funakoshi Gichin, the `father of modern karate', who had introduced the art into Japan from Okinawa in 1922. Yoon Pyung In, founder of the Chang Moo Kwan, become a fth Dan in Shudokan Karate under Toyama Kanken. Choi Hong Hi of the Oh Do Kwan, future `father of Taekwondo' and founder of the ITF, was awarded a 2nd Dan in Shotokan while at Tokyo University. Hwang Kee of the Moo Duk Kwan claimed Yamaguchi Gogen of Gojo-Ryu Karate as a personal friend, and quoted a `Mr. Idos' (Itosu) as a source for his school's hyungs...'_

The point is that the core of the actual martial arts _practice_ that these gentlement brought to Korea was karate. It's no accident that in 1968, S. Henry Cho titled his then state-of-the-art manual _Tae Kwon Do: Secrets of Korean Karate_, and throughout the book uses the term `karate' to refer interchangeably to Okinawan, Japanese and Korean `flavors' of what he calls a `universal' system with local variants and adaptation. 

I've heard references to the supposed influence of indigenous fighting systems like taekyon. But I have never seen any good documentation of what the content of taekyon is or was---there are articles on the history of TKD which maintain that it was a kind of competitive game rather than a full martial art, while others deny that. But what did it consist of? Do we actually have any substantive information of how it worked? I'm not asking this rhetorically; maybe information on that does exist, but I've never seen it.



Last Fearner said:


> As long as I have been around Taekwondo, I have never experienced any type of control over what I teach by the Korean Government.  Smaller organizations (ATA, ITF, etc.) tend to control what is taught more than the Kukkiwon or Korean Government.  Minimum standards only help to set guidelines and prevent low quality certification.  Taekwondo instructors, inside Korea as well as out, have always been able to teach whatever they want beyond the basics that are laid out in any curriculum established by the Kukkiwon.
> 
> The WTF is only used for competition guidelines, and has no control over the daily class, nor the reality and effectiveness of the self defense.  Yes, what is practiced for tournaments *can*, and typically *does*, enhance the athlete's ability to perform in real-life self defense situations - provided they round out their training with the full curriculum.  The two realms compliment each other.


 
That's the theory. But I don't it works out anything like that in practice. The problem is and continues to be that---as I see it---the WTF/Kukkiwon promotes TKD on an almost entirely sports basis, so that the full range of fighting techniques implicit in the hyung is often omitted from dojang curricula, both in the US and, as I've heard from people who've studies TKD in Korea, over there as well.  




Last Fearner said:


> The reasons for changing poomsae go way deeper than one man writing a book (although it is a contributing factor), and none of the decisions were petty, by any means.  We are talking about a nation of people who were oppressed, murdered, raped, and nearly absorbed into another culture.  Re-establishing Korean identity, language, history, and roots to *all* things in their past means everything to them.



Of course it does. The Koreans were subject to treatment for which the term `genocide' doesn't seem too strong, and the Japanese government has yet to even acknowledge their savage abuse of the Korean people with anything close to candor. But Terry's question was about the evolution, or lack thereof, of TKD. I offered the politicization of the hyungs, which you seem to be implicitly accepting as a fact, as an example of centralized monitoring over the content of TKD, and suggested that this was not conducive to the kind of ongoing, freewheeling experimentation and diverse development of different aspects of the art which leads to `good' evolution, i.e. progress.





Last Fearner said:


> Being secure from their northern brothers who attempted to over-take their freedom in 1950 is of high concern.  Making a stand in the global community, and appearing as a fully identifiable Korean nation who has a right to sit at the table with other world leaders is not a petty concern.  Economics, cultural pride, and survival drive decisions in most every nation.  Why should Korea be different?  Why should Koreans be criticized for wanting these things?  Taekwondo is as much a point of national pride to them, as baseball, American made cars, and Rock and Roll music is to Americans - - even more so!



Again, you're providing arguments for why Korea wants to monitor the content of its high profile MA `brand'. And I don't disagree at all! But the question Terry asked is not about _why_, but about _what_---specifically, what has gone wrong (as he sees it, and I agree, there's something definitely wrong).



Last Fearner said:


> There is good and bad in the development of Taekwondo through modern schools.  I don't care for anything to revert back to old times - - just preserve the foundations from Korean history (as it should be) and keep striving for perfection in our modern day practice, sports, instruction, and real-life application of genuine Korean Taekwondo.



I don't see why we need to `preserve the foundations of Korean history'---surely that's a job for the Koreans, no? Though you could make the case that TKD as Korean karate _is_ a fact of Korean history, and a much ealier part, obviously, than the moden martial sport that TKD seems to rapidly morphing into.


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## exile (Sep 16, 2006)

BTW, invocation of taekyon in this context may make the opposite point of the one Last Fearner is arguing for. Notice what Cho says about taekyon:

_Initially, to those who were planning to be professional soldiers, taekyon was merely a for of bodily training and physical conditioning. As time passed, however, taekyon is believed to hae been influenced by karate which must have been influenced from the neighboring country of China._

In other words---if Cho is right---the martial applications of taekyon were already guided by the Chinese MAs which are also the source of the Okinawan, then Japanese fighting systems that came back to Korea in early 20th century. Insofar as we're talking about a fighting art, then, taekyon may be no more indigenous than the Pyang Ahn forms that came into TKD from Okinawa via Japan.

Or maybe Cho is wrong. How can we tell? The problem is, with taekyon, so much is supposition and undocumented speculation. Our own Martialpedia, if I recall correctly, tells us that the role of taekyon in the formation of TKD is seriously disputed---and given the lack of documentation of it, how could it be otherwise?


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## exile (Sep 16, 2006)

Sorry, the last part of that quotation from Cho should be, `must have been _introduced_ from the neighboring country of China.'

The preceding and following context makes it clear that SHC believed taekyon to have orginated as a kind of leg exercise training routine. I've heard it described as a competitive game, the lower body analogue of arm-wrestling or something similar, and all sorts of other things. Again: what basis in the historical record is there for deciding amongst these alternatives?


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## Last Fearner (Sep 18, 2006)

I certainly do not want to take Master Stoker's thread too far off topic with an in-depth, and everlasting debate on the origins of Taekwondo, or Korean Martial Art in general. However, there is some significance to the conversation as to why there seems to be little evolution of Taekwondo, and my answer is based partially on the fact that many people have limited understanding, and strongly held misconceptions about what Taekwondo is, and where it came from.

These misconceptions are mostly based in limited research (if any) which often boils down to internet regurgitation of the same quotes from people with their own limited points of view, or biased personal agendas. Many Korean Grandmasters who are quoted about the history, speak from their own perspectives, and seldom take into account a larger, more connected path of events, and a philosophy that departs from the context of the written word, and people's opinions about who did what, when, and why.



exile said:


> This passage makes it sound as if General Choi's training was the only source of the martial art that was packaged as TKD in the mid-fifites.


Not to be argumentative with you, exile, because I do respect your opinions, but the passage you quoted does not imply that General Choi was the only source at that time. In fact, quite the opposite! I do acknowledge, and often emphasize, that there where many who contributed to the modern day emergence of the Kwans, what was taught in each of those Kwans, and how it all came together to be labeled as Taekwondo.

However, the most important point that I was making, which goes in line with the original topic of this thread, is that many people who study Taekwondo (in one form or another) these days, tends to place a heavy focus on the events following WWII, the instructors involved in the Kwans at that time, and their recorded background in Japanese Martial Art.

Since the majority (if not every single one) of those Kwan founders, were born after the occupation began (or became a student of the Martial Art during the occupation) then it is obvious that there is going to be a Japanese Martial Art history there. With that notion, there would be no such thing as Korean Martial Art, no matter what name you chose.

My focus is on the fact that Koreans had methods of unarmed combat dating back to the first century B.C., which combined with their cultural identity, spiritual beliefs, moral conduct, and defense of their nation, made it their own indigenous art - regardless of what origins it came from thousands of years B.C., or what influences occurred throughout the later centuries. Virtually ALL combat, armies, weaponry, and unarmed fighting, in all countries were influenced to some degree by others. It is futile to argue against that fact, and frivolous to claim that any of these Asian countries don't have their own unique Martial Art.

These people, like in your quote, who call General Choi the "father of Taekwondo" are fostering the notion that he "invented" or "created" the skills contained in the art. A few decades ago, some called him the "father of *modern* Taekwondo." Others have removed the word modern, which was intended to denote his contributions post WWII. At best, he reorganized, and repackaged what was already in existence, and *also* called what he did in his Oh Do Kwan, "Taekwon-Do." Many of the other Kwans agreed to use the same term, but the word "Taekwondo," today, should be understood as representing a long chain of events that stem back to the three kingdoms period.

This why, I believe, we see so little evolution of Taekwondo on the surface. Because so many students of "modern Taekwon-do" think of it as a modern creation, developing since WWII, and based mostly in Karate. They rob this Native Korean Art of its historical identity because of the more documented recent events, and personal, eye-witness testimony of those who have only been alive for less than one-hundred years.

Behind the scenes, those who are deep into Taekwondo, have no problem with the evolution. It is those who are stuck in this modern definition, feeling like Taekwondo is not even a true Korean art, or believing the hype of others that it is a sport (that is the WTF's job - and part of the promotion by the Korean Government). The real art is self defense (as promoted by the Kukkiwon) and is from ancient Korean fighting arts.



exile said:


> I've heard references to the supposed influence of indigenous fighting systems like taekyon. But I have never seen any good documentation of what the content of taekyon is or was---there are articles on the history of TKD which maintain that it was a kind of competitive game rather than a full martial art, while others deny that. But what did it consist of? Do we actually have any substantive information of how it worked? I'm not asking this rhetorically; maybe information on that does exist, but I've never seen it.


What did General Choi say about his training in "taekyon" as a youth in Korea. Did he describe it as a sport, or a game? Did he later claim that he combined his Taekyon kicking with his Japanese hand skills to create Taekwondo. Well, he was not the first to put hand and foot together, but the taekyon was, indeed, Martial Art training.

Quotes from General Choi's book, *Taekwon-do The Art of Self-Defence* (1965):

"T'ae-Kyon, the ancient name of Taekwon-Do, was as old as the history of the Hwarang-Do. There was a primitive activity known as T'ae-Kyon in the Silla Dynasty about 1,300 years ago."

"His father sent him to study calligraphy under a well-known teacher Mr. Han Il-Dong." "Mr. Han, a great calligrapher, was also a veteran of the ancient T'ae-Kyon." "Thus it came about that in 1936 the author took up T'ae-Kyon, which was consisting solely of foot maneuvers."

Taekyon was ancient. Subak was also ancient. The Hwarang used the ancient skills in military combat training. People of those days (1st through 6th century A.D.) probably did not worry or argue about the origin of their skills. They did not hesitate to evolve their training and make it into what they needed for exercise, moral and spiritual cultivation, self defense, and survival.

Today, Taekwondoists need to connect to those roots, and make Taekwondo their own. Learn the ancient skills, and why they were taught, then apply that knowledge to modern day circumstances. I think many people are afraid to evolve in that they might be accused of not teaching Taekwondo anymore. Keep the core, and adapt its application to every new situation - - that is what Taekwondo is.



exile said:


> Again, you're providing arguments for why Korea wants to monitor the content of its high profile MA `brand'. And I don't disagree at all!


No, what I was referring to was Korea's "pride" in their National Art, and wanting to set some minimum standards for Black Belt and instructor certification, yet I clearly stated that the neither the government, nor the Kukkiwon, nor the WTF attempts to control what is taught in the classroom (and I have trained and taught in Korea). All an instructor is expected to do is prepare their students to be eligible to promote to each Dan level with the minimum basic requirements. Any instructor worth their weight goes way beyond that with their full curriculum.



exile said:


> But the question Terry asked is not about _why_, but about _what_---specifically, what has gone wrong (as he sees it, and I agree, there's something definitely wrong).


Actually, Master Stoker's original question was "why."



terryl965 said:


> Why have we not seen more evolution in the Korean Arts over the last 10 years


 
My answer was, we have in remote places, but in the forefront of public attention, all they see is the sports, flashy demonstrations, and hear the limited perspective that Taekwondo came from Japanese Karate. That's what's gone wrong, and why people hesitate to take the helm into a new direction in future generations.



exile said:


> I don't see why we need to `preserve the foundations of Korean history'---surely that's a job for the Koreans, no?


Actually, you misquoted me, and misunderstood my meaning. I did not say to preserve the foundations "of" Korean history; I said to preserve the foundations "from" Korean history. The difference being that I am not talking about a history lesson, but finding the core knowledge, and foundations of the Korean Martial Art that existed in history, and preserving the intrinsic nature of the original art. Then, moving forward into modern times, we can evolve the art as needed, without fear of losing the identity of this unique system, the scientific principles and philosophies upon which it was built, yet keeping it effective, fresh, and current for all times.

This is a serious topic, for serious discussion among Taekwondoists, and I thank Master Stoker for posing the question, and exile and others for respectfully discussing, and even debating the valid points.

CM D.J. Eisenhart
_____________________
Last Fearner


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## exile (Sep 18, 2006)

Hi Last Fearner---wow, you either stay up even later than I do or wake up a lot earlier! I'm glad to get your informative and very helpful response. I want to clarify some of what I was saying earlier---I may not have been clear about some of the points we differ on, and in some cases the differences are way more apparent than real. The issues are in a lot of cases matters of differing emphasis, I think. I have a bunch of stuff to do this morning but I'll get back to your post later on in the a.m. as soon as I can...

One thing I want to suggest now, though, is that we go back to Terry and get him to point out just where he thinks other MAs have evolved (in the direction of progress) that TKD hasn't. I was never quite sure where he felt the continuing development of TKD in particular came up short, as vs. Hapkido or Karate or Wing Chun or...  that might help sharpen the form of the discussion. I was imposing my own personal take on what was at issue, but maybe Terry had something else in mind...

More later as so as I can.


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## exile (Sep 18, 2006)

OK, so now back to Last Fearner's most recent post... there's a lot in there. This is what I'd like to do: respond to some of the issues LF brought up in connection with my previous posts, and then lay out what I think of the context in which it seems reasonable to talk about the evolution of KMAs. 








Last Fearner said:


> Not to be argumentative with you, exile, because I do respect your opinions...



...as I respect yours, LF---when I was a `lurker' on the MT site before signing up, I always looked forward to seeing your posts on whatever thread I was reading.



Last Fearner said:


> ... but the passage you quoted does not imply that General Choi was the only source at that time.



Let me explain: I was responding to your observation that 

_General Choi, Hong Hi had learned Karate, and much of his own methods of teaching, and his Chang Hon forms were based on that knowledge.

The collection of Korean Martial Art, which eventually came to be called "Taekwondo" as a result of the 1955 meeting, is to represent the historical roots, and origins of Korean Martial Art (Subak, Taekyon, Hwarang-do, Hapkido, etc), which did exist long before the Japanese occupation. The Korean Government's choice to use the term "Taekwondo" is not intended to represent the same thing that General Choi intended it to represent.
_

I took this to mean that for you the important issue was the Korean government's aspirations for TKD as vs. Choi's particular vision, and since Choi had come in with his Shotokan training and seemed to be attempted to build a Korean martial art on a largely Shotokan foundation (whatever additional elements he might have wanted to introduce), I thought it would be relevant to note that it wasn't just Choi who had come in with a karate-based perspective on what the emerging national Korean MA should be, but a lot of other instructors as well---it was pretty much the whole set of founders of the postwar kwan network that sat down together in the mid-1950s and hammered out the official Korean MA `brand', which they called TKD. That's what I was getting at...



Last Fearner said:


> .In fact, quite the opposite! I do acknowledge, and often emphasize, that there where many who contributed to the modern day emergence of the Kwans, what was taught in each of those Kwans, and how it all came together to be labeled as Taekwondo.



...and yes, it turns out this is something we do agree on.




Last Fearner said:


> .However, the most important point that I was making, which goes in line with the original topic of this thread, is that many people who study Taekwondo (in one form or another) these days, tends to place a heavy focus on the events following WWII, the instructors involved in the Kwans at that time, and their recorded background in Japanese Martial Art.
> 
> Since the majority (if not every single one) of those Kwan founders, were born after the occupation began (or became a student of the Martial Art during the occupation) then it is obvious that there is going to be a Japanese Martial Art history there. With that notion, there would be no such thing as Korean Martial Art, no matter what name you chose.



Right---your interest is in what happened in Korea that merged with that heavy injection of Japanse MA styles to yield something distinctively Korean...



Last Fearner said:


> My focus is on the fact that Koreans had methods of unarmed combat dating back to the first century B.C., which combined with their cultural identity, spiritual beliefs, moral conduct, and defense of their nation, made it their own indigenous art - regardless of what origins it came from thousands of years B.C., or what influences occurred throughout the later centuries...the word "Taekwondo," today, should be understood as representing a long chain of events that stem back to the three kingdoms period.


 
Right---but this is one of the critical points I want to get to, because of the great difficulty of identifying with any certainty just what it was those original indigenous MAs actually were, and---more to the point---how much of their content was actually responsible for the evolution of the KMAs over the past decade, the period Terry was referring to. Just to anticipate: my own suspicion is that other factors than conservation of indigenous fighting forms were driving this evolution---what I see as the sport overspecialization of TKD. 



Last Fearner said:


> This why, I believe, we see so little evolution of Taekwondo on the surface. Because so many students of "modern Taekwon-do" think of it as a modern creation, developing since WWII, and based mostly in Karate. They rob this Native Korean Art of its historical identity because of the more documented recent events, and personal, eye-witness testimony of those who have only been alive for less than one-hundred years.
> 
> Behind the scenes, those who are deep into Taekwondo, have no problem with the evolution. It is those who are stuck in this modern definition, feeling like Taekwondo is not even a true Korean art, or believing the hype of others that it is a sport (that is the WTF's job - and part of the promotion by the Korean Government).



But wait---there are two different threads here. One is the perspective of the people who believe that TKD is the upper stories of a structure built most firmly on the acquired Okinawan/Japanese arts that we agree were the basis of the `Kwan phase' of TKD. And the other is the view that TKD is and should be a sport primary, and that anything else is beside the point. And those are two very different takes on the recent evolution of TKD and KMA more generally. Because people in the first group you're talking about, which I guess would include me, are concerned primarily with the loss of self-defense, combat applicability of TKD and want _that_ aspect of it to reassume center-stage, or at least get a bit more of the stage---serious endorsement in the Kukkiwon curriculum, for example, with bunkai analysis
of the hyungs that takes them as manuals of hard, combat-applicable techniques along the lines that recent trends in Okinawan/Japanese karate have done. This is as far from the `TKD = Olympic sport' point of view as you can get!



Last Fearner said:


> The real art is self defense (as promoted by the Kukkiwon) and is from ancient Korean fighting arts.



I agree entirely with the first part, except that I don't really see the Kkwn promoting this aspect of it very heavily. But it's the part about the ancient Korean component as the core of TKD's and other KMA's self-defense system that I haver trouble with


What did General Choi say about his training in "taekyon" as a youth in Korea. Did he describe it as a sport, or a game? Did he later claim that he combined his Taekyon kicking with his Japanese hand skills to create Taekwondo. Well, he was not the first to put hand and foot together, but the taekyon was, indeed, Martial Art training.

Quotes from General Choi's book, *Taekwon-do The Art of Self-Defence* (1965):

"T'ae-Kyon, the ancient name of Taekwon-Do, was as old as the history of the Hwarang-Do. There was a primitive activity known as T'ae-Kyon in the Silla Dynasty about 1,300 years ago."

"His father sent him to study calligraphy under a well-known teacher Mr. Han Il-Dong." "Mr. Han, a great calligrapher, was also a veteran of the ancient T'ae-Kyon." "Thus it came about that in 1936 the author took up T'ae-Kyon, which was consisting solely of foot maneuvers."

All right, so here is how I see the history of Korea breaking down, based on the firmness of our knowledge about it. We have the first, vast ancient prehistoric phase, with a huge number of distinct ethnic groups wandering around northern Asia---the linguistic diversity of that group speaks for itself. A lot of cultural and genetic exchanging going on, but all we have left from that phase, apart from the complex linguistic relations, is a lot of archaeological material. Next we get the gradual emergence of the Three Kingdoms phase, about which we know a lot, but not really enough---from the MA point of view, we don't really know just what it was that the Hwarang were learning---we really don't have detailed knowledge of their fighting systems. We don't know what its relation to Su Bahk or Taekyon was, and we don't even know how much of what we read from this time is accurate and how much is legendary history---after all, historians are now pretty sure that a lot of what is in Herodotus and Thucydides on European history was legendary, and they were, for their time, relatively careful scholars. Dark Age Britain and the Arthurian legends offer the same problem in another context. So it's just hard to know what we know from this phase. The third period takes us up to the twentieth century---and we _still_ don't have detailed historical information on just what the MA scene in Korea was like or what people were doing (though we know that the combat arts went into a sustained period of decline for many centuries at one point, that much knowledge was lost, but we don't know what that knowledge was, obviously, or how it was connected to the fighting methods of the Three Kingdoms period, etc.) The final phase is the early 20th century up till 1955 (from the point of view of TKD, anyway), where we suddenly have a huge amount of knowledge of the details of the fighting systems based on works of the original Okinawan masters and their Japanese inheritors, and in particular we have the treasure-house of fighting techniques built into the katas and hyungs. And then we have the 1950s to the present era. 

The problem is that for the first three phases, the vast majority of Korean history, we have very little knowledge of the form of the indigenous fighting arts you've mentioned. Yes, they must have existed (though many probably went extinct too; but which ones?) But so far as I can tell, no one even in Korea really knew much about them to describe them in detail or create forms based specifically on _them_. I just don't see the Korean government being guided by this very attenuated knowledge of ancient, only dimly remembered fighting systems in setting up its mandate to the Kwans to create a unified system. What I see is the need of the military, the prime players in the military dictatorship that South Korea was at the time, for a unified training system for its soldiers. And later on, I see the role of point-fighting sports TKD as the main pressure affecting the evolution of TKD, with results that we both dislike.

In support of my argument that it wasn't Taekyon which led to the development of TKD, I would say that the same tendency has been observed (and lamented) in sports karate---Iain Abernethy makes this point repeatedly in his books on combat-oriented bunkai. Those techniques seem to be what create the marketable flash in modern tournament sports based on the traditional fighting arts of Asia.



Last Fearner said:


> Actually, Master Stoker's original question was "why."



Yes, but I took his question---`Why are we seeing X'---to be basically the question, `What brought X about'---a request for clarification of the various factors that led to the decline he alluded to.



Last Fearner said:


> Actually, you misquoted me, and misunderstood my meaning.



Right, and it seriously changed the your meaning---my apologies.



Last Fearner said:


> I am not talking about a history lesson, but finding the core knowledge, and foundations of the Korean Martial Art that existed in history, and preserving the intrinsic nature of the original art. Then, moving forward into modern times, we can evolve the art as needed, without fear of losing the identity of this unique system, the scientific principles and philosophies upon which it was built, yet keeping it effective, fresh, and current for all times.



I agree completely on this point. My own idea is that a big part of our success will involve studying the hyungs to recover the no-nonsense, hard applications that they embody, along similar lines to what a lot of combat-oriented practitioners in Karate are doing. Not the only part, of course! But an important one, I believe...anyway, thanks for your patience and forebearance (and apologies for the length of this post, but you presented a lot of material!)


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## exile (Sep 18, 2006)

LF---when I said

_In support of my argument that it wasn't Taekyon which led to the development of TKD_, 

I had meant to write `devopment of TKD's promotion of high flashy kicks'---thinking too fast and typing too slow. It's only the tournament-style kicking aspect I'm talking about here, and that seems to have arisen in sports karate as well. Sorry for the unclarity in the original statement.


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## terryl965 (Sep 18, 2006)

exile said:


> Hi Last Fearner---wow, you either stay up even later than I do or wake up a lot earlier! I'm glad to get your informative and very helpful response. I want to clarify some of what I was saying earlier---I may not have been clear about some of the points we differ on, and in some cases the differences are way more apparent than real. The issues are in a lot of cases matters of differing emphasis, I think. I have a bunch of stuff to do this morning but I'll get back to your post later on in the a.m. as soon as I can...
> 
> One thing I want to suggest now, though, is that we go back to Terry and get him to point out just where he thinks other MAs have evolved (in the direction of progress) that TKD hasn't. I was never quite sure where he felt the continuing development of TKD in particular came up short, as vs. Hapkido or Karate or Wing Chun or... that might help sharpen the form of the discussion. I was imposing my own personal take on what was at issue, but maybe Terry had something else in mind...
> 
> More later as so as I can.


 

Exile and Last Fearner I believe in most parts of the world TKD is waterdown to the point that it has become nothing more than a game of tag(Sport). I also relize there are sport in Karate, Kickboxing ans MMA, but while these Arts focus only on sport, they have also grown in there development into a vital point of S.D. as well. Mostly in TKD all people talk about the High kick but yet in 90% of all sport tournament it is the roundhouse to the mid section and back kocks in the same area. I do not feel that the Korean government and the highers ups are doing justice to the Art of TKD and are trying to move into a direction that would grow the Art aspect. Now w ith that being said there are still some old school Dojang out there that are making a different and I will not mention who they are. They are also going and helping developed more of a SD secture than the sport aspect.

While I believe TKD can be a valuable source for SD, most public opinion is different than mine and I for one would like to see it evolved into a more complete Art instead of a complete sport.
Terry


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## exile (Sep 18, 2006)

terryl965 said:


> Exile and Last Fearner I believe in most parts of the world TKD is waterdown to the point that it has become nothing more than a game of tag(Sport).



Boy, do I hear you there!



terryl965 said:


> I also relize there are sport in Karate, Kickboxing ans MMA, but while these Arts focus only on sport, they have also grown in there development into a vital point of S.D. as well. Mostly in TKD all people talk about the High kick but yet in 90% of all sport tournament it is the roundhouse to the mid section and back kocks in the same area. I do not feel that the Korean government and the highers ups are doing justice to the Art of TKD and are trying to move into a direction that would grow the Art aspect.



Again, I agree heartily. And I do think this reflects a deliberate choice by the Korean government. Now it's true, as Miles mentioned in his post, that the Kukkiwon is nominally private, and it's also true that it's nominally independent of the WTF. But my impression of the way business and government are linked in a number of postwar Asian societies is that the two work very closely together, particularly when matters of national prestige are involved---the recovery-era partnership in Japan between government agencies, economic planners and manufacturers/employers is the prime example, but I suspect a very similar arrangement existed in Korea as well. I find it hard to imagine that the Korean government, seeing Olympic recognition of its brand-name MA as a huge boost to national prestige, didn't put pressure, subtle or otherwise, on the early official TDK agencies to promote a highly sport-favorable form of the MA---pressure that has been sustained over quite a long time now. 



terryl965 said:


> Now with that being said there are still some old school Dojang out there that are making a different and I will not mention who they are. They are also going and helping developed more of a SD secture than the sport aspect.
> 
> While I believe TKD can be a valuable source for SD, most public opinion is different than mine and I for one would like to see it evolved into a more complete Art instead of a complete sport.
> Terry



Again I agree, and, though I don't want to put words in his mouth, from what Last Fearner wrote at the end of his latest post, it sounds like he does as well. But how do you think is the best way to do that, practically speaking?


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## terryl965 (Sep 18, 2006)

Again I agree, and, though I don't want to put words in his mouth, from what Last Fearner wrote at the end of his latest post, it sounds like he does as well. But how do you think is the best way to do that, practically speaking?Today 01:42 PM


Frankly by people like LF and yourself along with me and som other that would love to see the Art back in charge by voicing our concerns to those that have power and not sit back like those before us have done and agree with every high ranking official out there.

Will that ever happen it already is just not on a large scale and we need it to be on a large scale.

Too many Master and such cry about the same thing but yet refuse to voice there concerns and until they do we must force the battle to our students to preserve what is right.

Just my opinion
Terry


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## exile (Sep 18, 2006)

terryl965 said:


> Again I agree, and, though I don't want to put words in his mouth, from what Last Fearner wrote at the end of his latest post, it sounds like he does as well. But how do you think is the best way to do that, practically speaking?Today 01:42 PM
> 
> 
> Frankly by people like LF and yourself along with me and som other that would love to see the Art back in charge by voicing our concerns to those that have power and not sit back like those before us have done and agree with every high ranking official out there.
> ...



Hey Terry---I think that's the right approach for sure, though I don't really count much; I won't reach dan rank for another year or so, probably, but you and Last Fearner and some of the other contributors to the TKD and KMA are high-enough ranking, and articulate enough, to make the case. The problem is to ideantify which people among officialdom needs to get this message and what kind of leverage can be applied....

I think I heard---on one of the MT threads, I believe---about an article that was published in _Journal of Asian Martial Arts_ in 2005 about the decline in combat content of TKD and how it came about. Have you or anyone else on this thread seen that article? I'd love to get my hands on it---our library carries the journal, so I may trot over there and have a look. Will let you know if there really is such an article.


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## terryl965 (Sep 18, 2006)

exile said:


> Hey Terry---I think that's the right approach for sure, though I don't really count much; I won't reach dan rank for another year or so, probably, but you and Last Fearner and some of the other contributors to the TKD and KMA are high-enough ranking, and articulate enough, to make the case. The problem is to ideantify which people among officialdom needs to get this message and what kind of leverage can be applied....
> 
> I think I heard---on one of the MT threads, I believe---about an article that was published in _Journal of Asian Martial Arts_ in 2005 about the decline in combat content of TKD and how it came about. Have you or anyone else on this thread seen that article? I'd love to get my hands on it---our library carries the journal, so I may trot over there and have a look. Will let you know if there really is such an article.


 
Excile you are wrong it is you and the othe rfuture Dan ranks thast can make the difference in the TKD and KMA world for you are the future and your voice will be heard alot more of than mine and LF we have probaly been voicing our concerns forever in our community, we need yound strong opinion people like yourself to step up and say what is on there minds.
Terry


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## exile (Sep 18, 2006)

terryl965 said:


> Excile you are wrong it is you and the othe rfuture Dan ranks thast can make the difference in the TKD and KMA world for you are the future and your voice will be heard alot more of than mine and LF we have probaly been voicing our concerns forever in our community, we need yound strong opinion people like yourself to step up and say what is on there minds.
> Terry



Hey Terry---well, thanks for your very, _very_kind words, but listen, I gotta confess that you are a _lot_ younger than me---my next birthday is in March and I'm going to be 60 years old (which seems very strange to me since inside I still feel as though I'm 20---what _happened_??!!) It's true that I do heavy weight training and interval wind sprints in an effort to keep age and the Reaper as far away for as long as possible, and I've got good genes---my father died last year at almost 93 and my mother is still going strong at nearly 90---but both you and LF have a _lot_ more youth on your side than I have! I think I work and train as hard as any of the people in my TKD group... but really, from what I can tell, I'm oldest person on the TKD board. But I do plan to keep training and get to dan rank, and try to bring students into the art with the point of view you've been talking about. (My little boy is 9 and has been doing TKD with me from the beginning under our instructor Allen Shirley, so I guess he's going to be my first project in this direction).

That really may well be the key to it---getting students into the Korean arts who actually are excited not (solely) by the possibility of sports glory (how realistic is that for most of us, after all?) but by the idea of empowerment that comes from knowing you can protect yourself if you absolutely must. And also from the challenge of looking at a move and finally realizing, hey, now I see what that's for. 

Anyway, thanks again for your kind words, even though my youth hasn't been in my rear-view mirror for a long, long time...


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