Jargon And Terminology

Jigaro Kano, the founder/developer of Judo, had a Master’s in Education i.e. he had an academic background in teaching, and an understanding of how people learn etc. Kano, was the initiator of the colored belt system for grading (that most martial arts have adopted), and organized his syllabus, in a logical and ordered fashion. He understood that students need structure and direction in their learning, and organized his teaching and instruction to provide this. For me, as a Judoka, one of the most important and useful things he did was to name his techniques/throws in a literal and descriptive fashion – in fact the teaching points of the throws are contained in the names e.g. the throw called Harai-Goshi, meaning “Sweeping Hip”, instructs you to sweep the “Hip” when you execute the throw; however many people don’t do this, and sweep the leg – I’ll hazard a guess, that Kano, understood this common mistake, and put a reminder/rectification in the name, so that practitioners would remember what the key component of the throw actually is. I believe that as an educator, Kano understood that jargon, fancy names and terms etc. can get in the way of learning, and can actually misdirect a student so that they execute a technique incorrectly.

There is a huge danger in renaming things, as an emphasis can be lost and a misdirection can occur. This can be clearly seen, in the variant of Tai-O-Toshi (“Body Drop Throw”), that is taught in Sambo (a form of Russian Wrestling), as “Front Trip”. A “traditional” Tai-O-Toshi, as opposed to that often seen in competition, involves no leg on leg contact, between the thrower (Tori) and the person being thrown (Uke); the power comes from the person executing the throw, dropping (and turning) their body at speed, in order to take their opponent’s balance and throw them. In Sambo, the “Front Trip” throw, which is executed almost identically to Tai-O-Toshi, sees one of the thrower’s legs placed against the shin of the person being thrown, in order to “trip” them as they drop their weight and pull them forward/round. Despite looking almost identical, these are two very different throws, with the different names, changing the emphasis on the key working of the throws; one is powered by a downwards shift in weight, which pulls a person over, with the other relying on an almost opposite idea, which is to block a person’s movement by tripping them.

Descriptive terms, which explain the concepts and ideas behind a technique or principle make more sense than abstract terms and jargon, however the world of self-protection and security, loves to come up with abstract terms and terminology that need to be translated, before they can be understood. I see this a lot in the way that numbers are used, when people talk about level 1, stage 2 etc. Numbers in and of themselves don’t convey any understanding, meaning or message. They are useful in suggesting an idea of progression, but that is all. Telling someone that they need to act and behave in a “Stage 3” situation, means that they have to translate “Stage 3” into some form of descriptive term/definition, and then do the same for “Stage 1” and “Stage 2”, before they can orientate themselves, understand where they are in their landscape, and start to formulate a plan of action. If “Stage 3”, was given a title/name that described the stage/phase, such as “Pre-Conflict”, a person can easily understand by the name/title that this is the stage preceding the actual conflict, and the next phase stage, is not “Stage 4”, but the conflict/fight itself – there is no wasted time in having to translate a number into a descriptor, and having to reference that number in relation to others etc.

Jargon and terminology, is a great way, to put barriers up to learning, and create a language that only those who have taken the time to educate themselves to it can use and understand, however it doesn’t help when a situation needs to be understood quickly, and acting decisively is key. Even if you are fluent in a second language, it is still a second language, and to understand what someone is saying a translation process needs to occur. If you are an English person who speaks French, standing in a compound, with a French soldier, who instructs you in French that there is incoming fire, you will still need to translate that; depending on your fluency it might be almost instantaneous, but in most cases there will be some form of delay – the length of time that it takes you to make the translation could have disastrous consequences for you. If your self-protection language has too much jargon, and is too abstract, you may be slowing down a person’s ability to understand what is going on around them, and what they should do. It will also be impossible for a person to understand that “language” subconsciously, as it will always need to be consciously translated.

The names, terms and phrases we use, when talking about personal safety concepts and ideas, should be as descriptive as possible, and contain as much information and ideas as is possible in a simple name or term. It should be remembered that it is the idea/concept that we want to communicate and the name/term we give it should reflect that – we should also not get too concerned if people can’t remember the name or term as long as they understand what it is referring to. Our goal should not be to create a “new” language but to impart knowledge and understanding.