What's in a name? "Sisuk" (part 4 of a series)

This is part 4 of a series regarding martial arts titles. I started the series with the titles used in my classes. Although the titles may have different context from school to school, I hope this series clarifies things for my own students; in terms of the actual meaning of the title and its context at Seattle Wushu Center's Kajukenbo classes.

In the context of Chinese martial arts (kung fu), "sisuk" (师叔) refers to a junior kung fu uncle. It's a title of respect used for a fellow student or teacher who is of a lower status or ranking than one's teacher.

Traditionally, the title would refer to your teacher's lower ranking classmate (from their own
Sifu's school) and you would call your teacher's younger classmate as "Sisuk". However in
some schools, the title can also sometimes refer to a student of the Sifu that is lower rank than the Sifu.

However, at our school, the title is given by the Sifu (me) and not an automatic form of address.
The title is given to those of purple to green belt who have expressed interest in becoming an assistant,
a coach or a future teacher. The Sisuk may assist students (with Sifu's supervision) up to their own rank.


Those that want to assist but haven't the time to attend other classes to assist, are called "Jo Lei" (assistant), but that's for another blog post!)