kata

What is the role of forms, or kata, in martial arts?

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Traditional martial arts, which are perhaps better described as “martial arts that are not sports”, tend to have a lot of forms, or kata. I’m thinking of karate, tai chi, wing chun, choy li fut, etc.

But what exactly is the role of kata, or forms? And has it changed over time?

In this new episode of the Heretics podcast I discuss the role of kata with Damon Smith who has extensive experience in various martial arts over decades.

It certainly became very trendy once MMA became a big deal to describe forms as useless, however, I think they do have uses, even today. As usual Damon has some pretty interesting insights into how forms have changed over time, and he can look back to the way they used to be trained in the 1980s compared to today.

Give it a listen!

Podcast.

Anan – Okinawan Karate kata

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Karate is something I’ve never done before, so it was a surprise to find myself doing some in the form of learning the Anan kata at a recent Foxfist event. The Anan kata is a nice little Karate form. In fact, there’s enough in there for it to be the only form you ever needed to learn for a small, self-contained, but effective, martial system. There are deflections, strikes, stand-up grappling and kicks.

The similarities between Okinawan systems and Southern Chinese martial arts systems are quite obvious in this kata, I think. But see what you think. Here is Anan being performed by somebody who, unlike me, knows what they’re doing with it.