Paper short abstract:

This paper considers the relationship of second order ‘thick descriptions’ of martial movement to reflexive first-order embodied experiences of such movement and awareness. It will explore the centrality of ‘hesitation’ in martial movement, and how uncertainty may go beyond a language of time and space to a feeling that the trained body intuits.

Paper long abstract:

Zanshin is a Japanese term used in martial arts training to speak about a calm state of body/mind awareness of others' bodies. Through developing this awareness one learns about timing and how to sense an opening, a momentary hesitation or uncertainty in the attacker or opponent's body that invites entry. One trains for many years to be able to feel, interpret and act upon such uncertain moments in the most effective way. In this paper, I will consider the relationship of second order 'thick descriptions' of martial movement to reflexive first-order embodied experiences of such movement and awareness. To do this I will draw on my own experience of training and teaching in aikido, a Japanese martial art practiced now around the globe, as well as from multiple voices of other practitioners of the craft. This will result not only in an understanding of the centrality of 'hesitation' in martial movement, but, more generally, it will suggest that one cannot understand hesitation simply as a gap in time that can be witnessed. Instead, in embodied contexts, uncertainty may go beyond a language of time and space to a feeling that the trained body intuits, or believes to intuit and that may indeed be absent for even the most knowledgeable and sensitive observer. This raises questions about the relations between observation, discussion, and participation on the path towards a 'thick' ethnographic description of embodied experience.