Taekkyon controversy?

[JusticeZero]

This came out of a different board, but it's one that was startlingly ill-suited to finding expertise on the topic..

Someone there was looking at Taekkyon - traditional Korean martial art/dance/sport - trying to find out about styles, availability, etc. and started asking Capoeiristas about a controversy regarding Dong Yi Taekkyon, which at least one other style of Taekkyon believes to be a fraudulent hybrid based on Capoeira.

For my part, I pulled down some Youtube videos and concluded that the style in question looked -less- like Capoeira than the original style making the accusations... the dynamics, footwork, power generation, and throws were done in ways that ignored or contradicted our style-specific principles. People assume that just because they see people moving their feet and doing anything remotely acro that it's us. Humbug. Not our fault this time methinks.

Nonetheless, since this popped up on a board frequented exclusively by practitioners of an art that has no ties to Asia whatsoever, I have no clue what anyone is talking about in any depth; has anyone here got a bit of a backgrounder on the subject?

[DWx]

I have never done Taekkyon or Capoeira but I can't really see how Dong Yi Taekkyon could be considered a hybrid of Capoeira (I had to look up videos too). To me, if anything, it looks more similar to TKD than anything else.

[JusticeZero]

Specifically what i'd concluded was:

OK, I looked up a KTA form, then some Dong Yi videos, and compared to my own training.

Conclusions:

Dong Yi actually seems to have LESS resemblance to Capoeira, structurally, than the KTA form work does. The Dongyi stylists look as though they are using their hips in virtually the opposite way that I was trained to move; it *looks* closer to Kung Fu kicking dynamics to me. I saw a few very "tricking" movements; they are not performed in a manner similar to Capoeira movements. Without having any background in the subject, I would sooner guess at a Wushu linkage than Capoeira. People tend to think that acrobatics and constant motion=Capoeira; it isn't so, though. There are people flipping around and refusing to stand still in most countries, imo.

The KTA people don't move like a Capoeirista, but a number of their body positions in footwork have more than a passing resemblance, structurally, to body positions found in the ginga, if those movements were disconnected and reassembled in a different order with a different flow. (Hardly evidence of a connection; people around the world have figured out stances like those for ages.)

The Dong Yi stylists use a heavy, hips-leading, swaying sawtooth zigzag walking pattern with each foot aligned with the stepping direction, and thus perpendicular to each other. It may be different from the structure of the others, but that structure is alien to Capoeira. The closest equivalent I can think of is negaca/request for arpao de cabeca/entrada de queixada/whatever you want to call it, and that movement is not only aligned online rather than across, but also involves toe shifts, and sways mainly in the UPPER body, not the hips. So, pretty much it had no resemblance to Capoeira, not even as a derivative structure.

The tricking over the head flips had some passing resemblance to chibata, but look again; they landed on their back, in a breakfall shape that I have not seen in Capoeira; it resembled something that a N. Shaolin guy showed me once or twice. I couldn't say that it was Chinese in origin; I don't recall the precise details and Koreans might have been falling similarly too. That basic shape isn't an uncommon one, but Capoeira has specific, highly distinctive notes in how it does it, deriving from the 'feet, hands, head' thing.

The kicks, too, just simply lack the distinctive signature feel of a Capoeirista. Every Cap teacher I have seen so far, to at least some extent, seems to coil energy from the extremities and ground to the hips and then finally the striking limb. One of the results of this is that the kicks tend to be oriented forward relative to the hips; one doesn't generally want to absorb force against opened hips for fear of injuring the muscles near the "boys".

Korean kicks, from what I have seen (and I am admittedly not a Korean stylist) tend to be based on principles of turning and opening the hips to the side in order to aim the powerful stomping muscles used to hold a walker upright into the target. Also a valid way to power a kick, but one that uses different principles, structures, and tactics. Also a reason why I have to explain over and over that Capoeira is NOT XMA TKD with a moving stance.

When viewing the Dong Yi clips, I note that kicks tend to use open hips rather than closed such as I would use. If one tracks the radiating force, generally it ends with the sole of the practitioner's shoe. This included the crescents; even though the kicks were directed to knock the target down, the force looked as though it curved down out the sole of the foot, which passed the target in order to wrap with the followthrough.

Maybe the guy was for real. Maybe he cribbed some Kung Fu in. Maybe he learned from some guy who just wasn't nearly as cool and awesome as "an ancient hermit".. "I was taught by Joe the homeless guy that everybody ignored because he smelled like booze and puke after he burned out from not wanting to reveal his awesome skillz. wow that sounds lame, we'll say it was a monk on a mountainside."

I dunno. I do know that Capoeira has a snotload of divergant styles in spite of it's common structure, so it doesn't seem too unbelievable that there was more than one person who knew the art and that they knew different regional variants. The important question would then be: Can they 'hang'? Toss the different styles in their context, is the "rogue" style's students going to get steamrollered? Because if they can hold their own, at this point I would just dismiss it as typical interstyle whining.

Nonetheless, all I had to work with was my own training and some clips. I don't actually know very much about where the Korean styles come from or claim to come from or might have plausibly come from or anything else.

[bushido_man96]

It appears to me, from reading your quote, that you examined things pretty well. I enjoyed reading your quote, and it appeared very informative.

I think that part of the problem is that there isn't a lot really known about the roots of Taekkyon. It is said that it was enjoyed among the criminal element of Korea, and gained popularity in that stead during the 19th century. Prior to that, it was claimed to have been a folk game of kicking, and it may have been. During the Japanese occupation, it went "underground," and who knew it and taught it skeptical at best.

When you start to read between the lines, you see that it has been used a political tool in Korea to promote the "Korean-ness" of TKD as compared to Karate. So, I think it would be tough to actually determine which Taekkyon is the real deal, and which is knockoff. Aside from that, I would doubt that there is any link to any Taekkyon style and any Capoeira style.

[RichardZ]

I have to agree with bushido_man. Usually these so-called obscure martial arts surface as a means to show credibility via history or ancestrial link. Simply and incorrectly, it is being laid to claim, if it is old, it has proven to be of worth. (This applies to anything in antiques also)

[isshinryu5toforever]

It's not as much of an obscure martial art as a lost one. It did have roots in Korea, it was fairly widely practiced at one time, but it no longer exists in it's original form. It is definitely a ploy to connect current martial arts in Korea to earlier ones in a bid for patriotism. They use the old game to justify the rules for TKD as well. 1 point was awarded for a body kick, 2 for a head kick, and a win was given if one player knocked down the other with a kick to the top knot. This is just one of the many political issues in Korean MAs.

[RichardZ]

I doubt it was lost. It is a matter to show historic link and creditibility.

Simply to say something once was, or long ago, ancient, etc., is to add intrique and in this case, tangible proud hierarchy

[Dark Planet]

To weigh in a bit late- I think, actually, Taekkyon is not a matter of faking it (for once, perhaps). There is (was?)a man in Korea who is a living "National Heritage" mark. Legally, speaking. He was a known to study with a Taekkyon master before the supression of martial arts and he survived the occupation. Song Duk Ki 's the name. He was born 1893.

If you read or know korean here is an interview http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWCLMmEH_88

Peace!

[JusticeZero]

Well, there is also the issue that there is another claimed lineage other than the one Song Duk Ki follows, which is disputed. As noted, it as only brought to my attention by claims that it was not Korean at all, but a modified form of -my- art. It isn't. =)

[wingedMonkey]

I did part of my korean thesis in college on taekkyun and it is actually a long ago martial art that at one point was the most popular in one of the Kingdoms. In fact at it's height the king practiced it, the only reason it stopped being made for peasents was because too much gambling began. Then the japanese occupied and tried to destroy it but one guy continued to practice and then the recent old grandmaster that died hadn't actually practiced it in several decades but came out to help out people trying to preserve it..as for dongyi, I believe it is rooted on the original Taekkyun but they do more dynamic stuff which may be why people thought it was a fake...but it isn't.