The fact that Aikido is not a democracy is a given. Neither is it a fresher version of an anachronistic return to feudal thinking, where there needs to be superior people over inferior people for the system to function...
Archive - September 2011
“Interview with Bruce Bookman,” by Meik Skoss
This interview was conducted in 1995 by Meik Skoss Bruce Bookman, 5th dan, is Chief Instructor of the Seattle Aikikai. He began studying aikido at age 12, under the direction of Yoshimitsu Yamada of the New York Aikikai...
Aiuchi 合打
Mutual strike or cut. Sword term used to describe the circumstance where two swordsmen strike each other simultaneously. In AIKI KEN terminology, often used in contradistinction to AINUKE where neither swordsman can...
“Aikido and Independence: On Not Finding One’s True Master,” by Peter Goldsbury
Aikido is a martial art full of paradoxes and some of these are due to the way in which instructors introduce and teach that art, especially to non-Japanese. I myself started practicing aikido because it was not a...
Interview with Kenji Tomiki, Part 1
This interview is the first part of a conversation with Professor Kenji Tomiki was conducted on January 4, 1974 at Waseda University in Tokyo. Read the second part of the interview here. Editor: Sensei, would you be...