Sumo in Contrast To Other Eastern Martial Arts
Sumo, while considered a martial art, diverges from the typical Eastern style both at the surface and at its heart. Whereas most martial arts award promotions through time and practice, sumo ranks can be gained and lost every two months in the official tournaments. Conversely, in more common Japanese martial arts (such as karate), ranks are gained after passing a single test, and practitioners of karate are not normally demoted, even after repeated poor performances at tournaments. This divergence from other martial arts creates a high-pressure, high-intensity environment for sumo wrestlers. All the benefits that sekitori wrestlers receive can be taken from them if they fail to maintain a high level of achievement in each official tournament.
Furthermore, sumo does not provide any means of achievement besides the official tournaments. Rank is determined solely by winning records during an official tournament. On the other hand, in many other Eastern martial arts, competitors can display their skill by performing standard routines, called kata or forms, to receive recognition. Thus, sumo wrestlers are very specialized fighters who train to win their bouts using good technique, as this is their only means of gaining better privileges in their stables and higher salaries.
Read more about this topic: Sumo
Famous quotes containing the words contrast, eastern, martial and/or arts:
“At this age [9–12], in contrast to adolescence, girls still want to know their parents and hear what they think. You are the influential ones if you want to be. Girls, now, want to hear your point of view and find out how you got to be what you are and what you are doing. They like their fathers and mothers to be interested in what they’re doing and planning. They like to know what you think of their thoughts.”
—Stella Chess (20th century)
“Should the German people lay down their arms, the Soviets ... would occupy all eastern and south-eastern Europe together with the greater part of the Reich. Over all this territory, which with the Soviet Union included, would be of enormous extent, an iron curtain would at once descend.”
—Joseph Goebbels (1897–1945)
“Strike the concertina’s melancholy string!
Blow the spirit-stirring harp like any thing!
Let the piano’s martial blast
Rouse the Echoes of the Past,”
—Sir William Schwenck Gilbert (1836–1911)
“In the arts of life man invents nothing; but in the arts of death he outdoes Nature herself, and produces by chemistry and machinery all the slaughter of plague, pestilence, and famine.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)