A THOUGHT FROM "SENSEI LOWRY"

IN JAPANESE, TITLES GO AFTER ONE'S NAME. IN ENGLISH, IT'S JUST THE OPPOSITE. SO MR. SUZUKI WOULD BE ADDRESSED IN JAPANESE AS SUZUKI-SAN, AND PROFESSOR SMITH WOULD BE SMITH SENSEI.

- DAVE LOWRY

You know this. You also know that I and others have frequently explained it. We have explained that to anyone with even a passing familiarity with spoken Japanese, calling someone "sensei Smith sounds as awkward as calling him "Smith the mister."

We have explained this and complained about it so often that you are probably tired of hearing it and you may have concluded that in the overall scheme of things, we're making too big a deal out of it. If some karate teacher wants to be called "sensei So-and-So," what's the big deal? Yeah, grammatically it's incorrect when speaking Japanese. But we're not speaking Japanese, so we don't have to follow those rules. Further, sensei Smith will insist, "Americans are more comfortable saving it that way."

These are not entirely invalid arguments. But please consider the following.

If you're not speaking Japanese, why use a Japanese term at all? Why call your teacher "sensei Smith" as a title of respect when you could just as easily say "Mr. Smith?" or "teacher Smith?" or "coach Smith"?

If they're honest, most martial artists will say that it's because sensei conveys a certain mystique, an air of respect and authority we don't associate with those other titles. Most karate teachers like being called sensei because it has a cachet. They want to be thought of as part of a Japanese art, a Japanese tradition.