Abstract
We'll be looking at the idea behind the Japanese martial arts, as they are practised all over the world. Martial arts of Far Eastern origin are often treated outside Japan as if they were one of the essences of Japanese culture. France and the French-speaking world are no exception. However, the driving force behind these practices is often misunderstood, or even diverted in a direction that is sometimes diametrically opposed. Instead of rectifying these "errors", we'll try to offer a new interpretation: based on the notion of the "medial body", we propose to observe how certain martial arts practices of Japanese origin conceal a hitherto almost hidden dimension; an underlying idea that will shed light on what the "medial body" implied in the19thcentury.
In many Japanese martial arts practices and exercises, the notion of antagonism, of rivalry between aggressor and aggressed, victor and vanquished, either does not exist or must be overcome. The opposition between the acting subject and the object that undergoes the action fades away; as long as this opposition persists, we fail to realize a medial body, and remain incapable of understanding the environment in which we find ourselves. How can we overcome the very notion of confrontation? The Cartesian distinction between subject and object must be cancelled out at the initiation stage. This implies that exercise consists in neutralizing muscular confrontation and annihilating the competition of competence with the measure of physical or mental strength. We could say that exercise consists in "living" the ecumene as mesology (proposed by Augustin Berque) attempts to define it.
Consequently, there are three aspects to our reflection. 1. From a theoretical perspective, we try to "go beyond" the classical dichotomy within exercise itself, a place of mutual interference between the agents involved. 2. From a critical perspective, our contribution questions several fundamental preconceptions of Western philosophical tradition. This is not, however, an essentialist opposition between the West and the East, as such a dichotomy runs counter to the aim of martial arts practice. It also implies that the very idea of "perspective" should be refuted. 3. Gestural practices are at once physical, mental and aesthetic (tactility and the haptic element predominate). The aim of technical research is to reactivate what is repressed by the perspectivism inherent in Western thought.
It's a game of alternation: as long as the focus is on competitiveness, practice doesn't "hold". Such is the "moving" dimension of the medial body, which wants to extend beyond the limits of verbal and linguistic enunciation; the idea of project vs. rejection must be replaced by that of the journey, or even the process of "doing": the frontier of mesology par excellence (insofar as tactility is based on the mutual interdependence of agents: we are touched by touching).
