Kata have been used by karate masters over the years for many reasons, e.g. to aggregate and help with the transfer of knowledge to their students, to help with training, conditioning, etc. But it is thought that when karate made it into the Okinawan schooling system thanks to Anko Itosu (and later onto the Japanese shores through Funakoshi), katas were systematically sanitised, with “dangerous” … Continue reading [ FEATURE ] The meaning of Bunkai (分解)