Established Form Archives - understand-culture

Stroke Order

Japanese children learn hitsujun, the order in which the strokes of a character are written. The Ministry of Education’s commentary on the curriculum for writing in the first two grades of elementary school asks pupils to write carefully, “following stroke order.” The standard taught in schools still goes back to a guide published by the Ministry of Education in 1958, the Hitsujun shidō no tebiki.

Writers on the subject point out that stroke order has no single, absolute norm, and that society has no one correct order. Schools still teach the order of the 1958 guide as the standard.

Forms in Judo

In judo, kata are set forms practiced in two roles, tori and uke, and the Kōdōkan asks that both roles be performed. The Kōdōkan writes that kata are something every holder of a dan grade should master, and that they are an important condition in the standards for promotion. A Nippon Budokan guide to judo lists the nage no kata, the forms of throwing, for the second dan.

To Learn and to Imitate

Manabu (学ぶ): to learn. The Digital Daijisen dictionary notes that it has the same origin as manebu (まねぶ), to imitate. The Nihon Kokugo Daijiten adds that which of the two came first is not known.

Momo kuri sannen kaki hachinen (桃栗三年柿八年): peaches and chestnuts take three years, persimmons eight. Everything takes its due time before it bears fruit.

Breaking the Form

Kata ga aru kara katayaburi, kata ga nakereba katanashi. Because there is a form, there can be form-breaking. Without a form, there is only formlessness. The saying plays on two words. Katayaburi, form-breaking, means unconventional. Katanashi, formless, means spoiled or ruined.

The saying is attributed to the kabuki actor Nakamura Kanzaburō XVIII. Its wording varies. A school newsletter in Sapporo quotes the ending as tada no katanashi, mere formlessness. An original source for either version has not been found.

Three Times the Same Story

In rakugo, a master often teaches a story by sanben geiko, three-time lessons. The master performs the same story three times in front of the apprentice, and then the apprentice performs it.

The storyteller Gokaidō Kumosuke, named a Living National Treasure in 2023, received such a lesson from Kokontei Shinshō V. Shinshō performed the story differently all three times.

Practice in Parts

In the tea ceremony, the first stage of training is warigeiko, practice in parts. It covers the basic procedures for thin and thick tea, almost everything that people picture when they think of the tea ceremony.

A paper in the repository of Aichi University says that warigeiko is basically taught not by the master but by the master’s senior pupils. It calls this stage of learning a stage of watching.

Two Hundred Omelets

At Sukiyabashi Jirō, the Tokyo sushi restaurant of Ono Jirō, an apprentice trains for about ten years before being allowed to make the tamagoyaki, the sweet rolled omelet.

The apprentice Nakazawa Daisuke, who appears in the documentary Jiro Dreams of Sushi, has said in interviews that he made it about 200 times before Jirō accepted one. In the film, he says he cried when Jirō finally said it was good.

Brush and Model

Under Japan’s national curriculum, pupils learn shosha, writing practice, with a brush in every grade from the third year of elementary school, with about 30 class hours a year.

In calligraphy, the student copies an otehon, a model. The teacher writes corrections and advice on each sheet in vermilion, shuhitsu. A calligraphy correspondence course of the company U-CAN returns every submission this way and sends the student models of his or her own name.

Stealing the Skill

In Japanese kitchens and workshops, newcomers are told waza o nusume, steal the skill. The expert does not walk the newcomer through the know-how step by step. He keeps working where the newcomer can watch, and expects the newcomer to master the skill over a long time. Cooks, craftsmen and technicians are among the trades that train this way. Sushi chefs say meshitaki sannen, nigiri hachinen: three years cooking rice, eight years shaping sushi.

In 2023, a debate on social media asked whether the method is outdated. A worker in the shipping industry wrote that those who say it do not teach because they have no theory of teaching.

Shu, Ha, Ri

A verse attributed to the tea master Sen no Rikyū reads: Kiku sahō mamori tsukushite yaburu tomo hanaruru tote mo moto o wasuru na. Keep the rules and forms completely. Even when breaking them, even when leaving them, do not forget the root.

The verse is linked to shuhari, the stages of learning a traditional art. Shu is holding to the basics. Ha is adapting them. Ri is developing one’s own way.