ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the development of martial arts during the Meiji period. During this period, the new modern Japanese state further developed the monopolies of violence, taxation, and means of orientation. It was during the Meiji period that martial arts went from being an exclusive part of the samurai we-identity to comprising part of the we-identity of the whole nation. The relationship between martial arts and Japanese we-identity became embedded within a very complex figuration, arranged along two poles of a continuum: ‘international Japaneseness’ (e.g. represented by Kanō’s organisations) and ‘indigenous Japaneseness’ (e.g. represented by the Dai Nippon Butokukai). Apart from these two established lines, the birth of certain ‘Okinawan Japaneseness’ started to take form through karate.
