Paper short abstract:

Based on a five-year ethnographic fieldwork between Japan (Tenri) and France (Orleans and Martinique), this paper investigates the role of material culture and sensations in judo performance (Hilpron, 2012).

Paper long abstract:

Based on a five-year ethnographic fieldwork between Japan (Tenri) and France (Orleans and Martinique), this paper investigates the role of material culture and sensations in judo performance. From an anthropological point of view, this Japanese discipline is an example of a global practice that generates many specific local variations (Hilpron and Rosselin, 2010). From the perspective of the ethnography of the action (Piette, 1996), judo is organized as an actions network on the actions of others, and supported on material culture.

In the fighters' duo, judokas bodies linked through kumi-kata, judogi and mat form a single volume: the body schema is expanded to include the other and the sensations are motor communication. To be effective, judo players have to be attentive to each other, to be able to do with the opponent in order to do better against him, and develop body awareness techniques (Hilpron et al., 2012) to be efficient.

Such an approach allows us to understand how judokas question the capacity of acting within the human possibilities by anticipatory reflex, below 450 milliseconds of the threshold of consciousness.

Hilpron, M., Hamard, A., Chenault, M. (2012). « Héritage oriental des Techniques de conscience du corps », Transverse, 1, p. 47-55.

Hilpron, M., & Rosselin, C. (2010). « Vécu corporel du judo et globalisation du sport : une comparaison France-Japon ». Journal des anthropologues, 120-121, 313-332.

Piette, A. (1996). Ethnographie de l'action. L'observation des détails. Paris, Métaillé.