Me Kata and George Donahue

Many years ago I met with George Donahue, who invited me to his apartment to discuss many martial ideas. At that time George was the Martial Arts publications editor for Tuttle Publishing, one of the publishing companies for serious martial publications. George had been raised in Japan and on Okinawa, had even been a child star for a TV series about a Samauri (where he played the star as a boy). George was also an exponent of a karate system called Kashiba Juku.

Our discussion covered many things but one of them just popped into my memory, the idea of Me Kata. He explained Me Kata was when the emphasis of a kata was to look more pleasing for public performance. Not a ‘bad’ thing per sea, but often on Okinawa Me Kata was used in a deriding manner that a kata was done just for show, and was less than martial.

So when I saw the blog entry about Me Kata at Motobu Ryu it sparked that memory.

Of course for Motobu-Ryu it is not seen in the same way, for their group acknowledges the like of their karate to older Okinawan dance.

Which makes the term a variable meaning depending on the context it is used.

However, remembering how George explained it to me, suggests to me something I have been feeling for a very long time. I have the impression, athletic prowess not withstanding, that what Japanese, and other International Competition kata (including much of what I see from Okinawa) could be more classified as Me Kata (eye kata) Performance to look better, appealing to audience and judge standards.

That does not preclude that there is martial potential, but IMO unless those kata are studied that way to exploit those martial potentials, they have just become “Me Kata” performances.

Any time an adjustment is made to a kata just to look better for the judges (or the audience) the chance become more that Me Kata has taken over.

Just my opinion.