The purpose of this study was to focus on the life stories of proficient kendo players and to clarify what kind of experiences they went through from the time they were exposed to kendo to the present day to become proficient in kendo. The subjects of this study were two persons who hold the 8th dan in kendo and have a history of teaching kendo. Both are outstanding kendo players who have won several championships at major tournaments in Japan, and both have extensive experience teaching kendo. Data collection was through a one-on-two narrative interview conducted by the two authors. The interview data were transcribed, and the narratives by the subjects, referring to Sakurai (2006), were focused on how they made sense of their proficiency in kendo. Furthermore, following the method of dialogical constructivism, we focused on the narratives of the two experts and presented them. The results of the analysis confirmed that the two subjects’ kendo mastery was shaped by their “memorable kendo experiences in their childhood,” which formed their orientation in the subsequent kendo proficiency process, and that they immersed themselves in “exploratory training experiences” in order to improve their kendo skills. The dialogical constructivist approach revealed that expert kendo practitioners, through their interrelationships with their surroundings, studied and devised their own kendo skills and training methods, and engaged in thoughtful and demanding yet engrossing practice. Furthermore, the value system of kendo experts is a process of continuous mastery as a kendo instructor as well as a
kenshi, and it is a complex structure that is not limited to mere improvement of kendo skills. This new viewpoint suggests that there are two parallel axes of kendo proficiency ; one as a
kenshi and the other as an instructor.
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