sorry if this upsets any one but whats the diffrence between

Blaze · White Belt

sorry if this upsets any one but whats the diffrence between shotokan karate and normal karate and the sensai and sempai sorry if i upset any one with this message i haven't joined a club yet and im trying to find out about karate before i join sorry again

iolair · Blue Belt

Generally, Senpai (meaning "senior") refers to a student at black belt grades 1st Dan to 3rd Dan, and Sensei (meaning "teacher") refers to black belt grades 4th Dan to 5th Dan. There are also Shihan ("master") for 6th Dan to 8th Dan, and Kaicho ("grandmaster") for 9th Dan or higher. Dan grades above 5th Dan are not given for Karate ability, but for "services to the art".

I believe (though this is overgeneralising) that differences between different Karate clubs/schools is often more significant than differences between styles. I've studied Seido Karate (based on Kyokushinkai), Seidokan (mostly based on Shorin ryu) and Shotokan, and to be honest between the three there's not much different in technique. The only characteristic difference that makes it easy to spot a Shotokan practitioner is that they chamber their punches from level with the hip/waist instead of level with the nipples in most styles.

Some other styles do vary a lot from the mainstream; Wado-ryu (I think, not sure) for example uses more circular techniques as opposed to linear ones.
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Currently: Kickboxing and variants.
Previously: Karate (Seido, Shotokan, Seidokan), Ju Jitsu, Judo, Aikido, Fencing.

Defender · White Belt

How intresting... my style uses the two words a little differently.

Sensei = Black belt teacher
Senpai = Non-black belt teacher
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Let fire burn and waters rage. Air spin and earth engulf. Let darkness fall and light reveal. Let demons yell and angels sing. I care not. Threaten those i defend and i will make sure that you fail

monkeygirl · KF VIP

You seem to have gotten some good answers so far.
Blaze: There's no need to apologize for asking a simple question. That's what we're here for

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1st dan & Asst. Instructor TKD 2000-2003
College student... 2 semesters left!

No matter the tune...if you can rock it, rock it hard.

Blaze · White Belt

o i was i bit unsure

Kirves · Black Belt

In dojos I've been to, sensei has meant the teacher. Sempai has meant an elder (=more advanced rank) student when he's guiding you.

In Japanese culture sempai often means someone who has more experience and is guiding the newbie a.k.a. kohai. For example, when you go get a new job, you are the kohai and the person who's done the job for years and has been assigned to show you how it's done, he's the sempai, the tutor. Hope this helps.

And the term karate... Karate is really just a blanket term covering most Okinawa-te based arts. There are lots of different styles with their differing techniques, methods, tactics, philosophies and application. During the first few years you won't notice much difference between two styles but when the basics are down (you're approaching the black belt) you will see the difference. Some arts use very linear tactics, some very circular, some use hard methods, some soft, some don't use throws and locks, some do, etc. Some have hard contact sparring with protective gear, some don't use gear, some dont use contact sparring, some don't spar. The list of differences between styles is endless, but they all start by teaching the similar basics for a few years.

The car metaphor was good. Karate as a term is like car. There are different karate styles. There are different cars. There are karates for purpose A, purpose B and purpose C. There are cars for purpose X, purpose Y and purpose Z. Some cars fit more to certain purposes than others. But my god, go ask a Ferrari enthusiast if Corvette is better, you get a huge argument! Same with karate, ask if some style is better and you'd better duck!

If the school just says "karate" call or go there and ask what's the style. If it's unknown to you, ask "Oh, never heard, tell me about it." Then come to the web and search around for info on that style.

Shotokan is a Japanese style (all karate is originally from Okinawa but after WWII some teachers went to Japan and thus some styles have been later found there) founded by Gichin Funakoshi. It uses lots of wide low stances and steps, too low and wide for practical use if you ask me (ask someone else and you get a different answer) and they use quite hard and linear methods. Wado ryu as a contrast, uses short stances, soft circular blocks, soft jujutsu derived methods of locking and throwing, while Shotokan guys tend to block hard and continue with merely hard punches and kicks till the end. This just to give you a short over-simplified two style comparison. There are lots of styles (dozens, if not hundreds) so you understand how difficult it is to answer quickly. Some styles (Uechi-ryu, Goju-ryu, Ashihara) often look from the onlooker as if the karateka moves little and goes up close to use knee strikes, elbow strikes and take downs. Other styles like Shorin-ryu, Shorinji-ryu, SHlTO-ryu, Shotokan, etc. use larger movements, trying to stay a bit farther from the opponent in order to use long range punches and kicks instead of going up close unless so required. But all this is too oversimplified! Educate yourself, go to a library and get books on different karate styles.

PS. I capitalized SHlTO-ryu because otherwise the forum software thinks there's a dirty word in it...

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