Styles versus Dialects

The way a language is spoken within a country depends on what area of the country the person was raised. All the people may speak the same language in a country, but they may have minor, or major, differences in the way they speak. Sometimes within the same country, people of one region will make fun of or criticize the way people of another region speak. The same is true for Taekwondo. There are sport, traditional, full-contact, mixed, etc. versions of Taekwondo. All versions have some elements in common and are recognizable between practitioners, but some people have difficulty understanding some aspects of the different versions.

We must careful not mistake a dialect with jargon or slang. While a dialect wants and needs everyone to be involved and participating, jargon and slang are exclusive. The members of some groups want to be separated from the masses, so they develop slang to make themselves different and so the public will not understand what they are saying. The same is true of Taekwondo. Some versions of Taekwondo try to be different, just to be different, such as Tae Bo. Similar to slang, these transient versions come and go. Only the original versions survive and flourish.

Accents versus Instructors

Within a language, local accents may be picked up from the people in a certain town. These accents are localized and may seem odd to outsiders. If you visit different Taekwondo schools, you will find small differences that may not be attributed to a difference in style, but to the personality or background of the instructor. This may cause confusion with beginners or visitors, but it is a natural occurrence.

Being a Black Belt versus Selling Auto Parts

Many black belts are similar to auto parts sales people. When you ask the sales person for a part, he or she asks you some questions about your vehicle, looks in a database for the part number, and retrieves the part. The person may be the best sales person in the store as far as total sales are concerned, but that is the limit of his or her abilities. The person does not know where the part is from, who makes it, what it does, where it is used on the vehicle, whether it will work in your particular case since you have made modifications to your vehicle, or whether another part would work in the same vehicle, but he or she is still the top sales person because he or she can sell a lot of parts.

Many Taekwondo black belts are the same way. If your ask them what technique to use in a particular situation, they have a stock answer that will work, but if you ask what style or country the technique is from, who founded it, what it does, where and when it should be used, whether it will work in your particular case, or whether another technique may be substituted, they are lost and confused. They only know what the "program" has taught them. They have no desire to further their knowledge and the instructors do not care because the black belts can move students through the system quickly.

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