A HISTORY OF MARTIAL ARTS AND SCIENTIFIC KARATEDO

 Marc Riley, Sensei 

No prior martial art training is required.  This project is not all about punching and kicking. Students learn to search for and find new and fresh understandings about themselves.  They learn to strive to reach a state of harmony with their environment through the study of the history of the multitude of forms of martial arts and their development from cultures from around the world.  The project focuses on aspects of geography, history and literature, anatomy, physics and philosophy as well as plenty of terminology.  Stereotypes are erased as students learn propriety, etiquette, control, dignity and grace through martial arts discipline and practices.

Our course explores different films, television series, advertising, books, magazines, games, and even music videos that have influenced our cultural perceptions on the martial arts. We study and write about the methods of their composition by documenting through journals and our project blog site.  The class learns basic self-defense techniques, kata (pre-arranged one person form), as well as kumite (multiple-person pre-arranged form.)

We focus on several themes in our required reading as we give food for thought on the search for self and how it relates to the historical context of the martial arts.