View Single Post
Old 08-07-2007, 11:26 PM   #93
Erick Mead
 
Erick Mead's Avatar
Dojo: Big Green Drum (W. Florida Aikikai)
Location: West Florida
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 2,619
United_States
Offline
Re: Bowing to Kamidana/Kamiza

Quote:
Joshua Reyer wrote: View Post
Quote:
Erick Mead wrote:
Why not?
Because it's unidiomatic. The word used in English is not arbitrary - it was chosen to follow Japanese nomenclature.
The looser and western usage IS idiomatic:
Quote:
wrote:
"form of speech peculiar to a people or place," from M.Fr. idiome, from L.L. idioma "a peculiarity in language," from Gk. idioma "peculiarity, peculiar phraseology," from idioumai "I make my own," from idios "personal, private," prop. "particular to oneself,"
The one thing about being peculiar to oneself is that one has no one to answer to. (There's a koan in there somewhere) .

In short, words mean what we agree that they mean, nothing more and nothing less. The only question is whether one is a party to a given agreement on a given word at a given place and time. Problems arise with untoward assumptions in changing usage, which is one point of Fred's enquiry -- whether usage and an aspect of tradition have departed so far that new usage or modified usage may make sense

Quote:
Joshua Reyer wrote: View Post
At core, I disagree with Mr. Little's core premise. ... "Is it appropriate for martial arts schools that are operated with no interest in or an active disinterest in those spiritual traditions to use the word "dojo" as part of their names?"
Not at all. Fred is just negotiating on a point of the usage in this setting, explicitly doing what we all collectively do less conciously as words shift their meaning and associations.

The degree of the reaction seems out of proportion.
But in a charitable view of your tagline I have some suspicion why:

Quote:
Somtyme this world was so stedfast and stable
That mannes word was obligacioun;
And now it is so fals and deceivable
That word and deed, as in conclusioun,
Ben nothing lyk, for turned up-so-doun
Is al this world for mede and wilfulnesse,
That al is lost for lak of stedfastnesse.

Cordially,

Erick Mead
一隻狗可久里馬房但他也不是馬的.
  Reply With Quote