Kata-based defences against combinations
Over the last 2 decades I've noticed an explosion of interest in karate in "bunkai" - applications of karate's kata (forms). There was a time (in the not too distant past) where karate had stagnated badly. Kata were practised almost in a vacuum: forms as a series of movements and no analysis on one hand - sparring or two person drills with no nexus to the kata on the other. This seemed to be the case since karate became popularised in Japan in the 1930s and was diluted for teaching to school kids. It only got worse in the 1950s and 60s when it spread to the West. By the 1980s I noticed a few teachers trying to claw the way back to bunkai as the primary source of karate knowledge. As just one example, Higaonna Morio sensei of goju ryu released his 8mm and later video tapes of kata and applications. Meanwhile, other teachers, like Hirokazu Kanazawa sensei of SKI shotokan, handled the dilemma in a totally different way, cataloging hundreds of two ...