Greetings, i recently posted this subject on my discussion forum. and was shocked at the replies. First my style is Tang Soo Do a korean art. so all the replies came from korean stylist. Now the forms (katas) or hyungs as the korean term goes are derived from shoto kan katas. now its no secret that these katas werent learned in china like our history would have you believe, they were taught by the occupuying japanese to the koreans! ok, after the end of the occupation of korea by the japanese many korean kwans or schools emerged, one being the Moo Duk kwan headed by hwang kee. which brings you to the martial art i have trained in for now 37 years. heres the problem! our katas are as follows pyung ahn 1 through 5 or in shoto kan heian 1 through 5 bassai nahanji 1 through 3 sip soo which in all realaty is jutte 10 hands jindo which =chinto kong san kun to view the sky+shoto kans kushinku row hi sei san whan su jion as you can see we use the same kata as shoto kan and as okinawan karate...classic katas! the problem lies here... and still goes on today...these classic katas have been altered and changed to not exactly mirrior the origional japanese and okinawan katas! even today if you belong to one school or federation they teach these katas one way, but so and so"s federation changes a few movements and does it differently. my opinion is it does an unjustice to the kata ...removes and leaves out important aspects of the kata. most replies stated that even the okinawan systems and shoto kan schools dont do them the way funakoshi taught them? they change them and alter them...i say BULL!!!!!i had a copy of funakoshis karate do khyon and just dont see anyone altering these katas who train in a japanese or okinawan system. so ive come here for an answere my friends. do you do your kata the way it was taught and introduced say 40 years ago unchanged? or does all systems of martial arts alter katas? just if i perform kata i want to do it correctly no matter what the koreans say!
