There is a lot of confusion with Western people about the meaning of Japanese words and expressions. One of these Japanese words is “nawashi”. We’ve asked Osada Steve to give us his view on the word “nawashi”.
The problem I have with misuse of the word nawashi is that too many people, including high-exposure fellows, seem obsessed with twisting the facts any way they can to replace knowledge with willful ignorance… thus feeding a whole generation with misinformation.
Linguistics: The Japanese language is made up of syllables all ending with a consonant. As a result you end up with a limited number of building blocks. So a lot of syllables that SOUND the same are to be found. Example: The SHI in Nawashi may sound like the SHI in Shibari, but that don’t mean they have anything else (than sound) in common. Matters are further complicated because kanji usually has two very different readings (albeit sounds). As a result people are often not able to properly read place names, because they don’t know which reading to apply. That’s why uncommon names are often accompanied by hiragana to help. So be careful not to jump to linguistic conclusions… because many Japanese words that sound alike have completely different meanings.
Also, you have things like Ya, Sha, Ka, Shi, and so on that are being used to describe the type of activity a person is engaged in. A Ya (as in fudosan-ya) is used to describe that a person’s profession is conducted inside a house (in this case a realtor). A Sha (as in gaku-sha) shows that the person is a scholar. A Ka (as in judo-ka) describes a person that excels in a certain activity (in this case judo). A Shi is usually affixed to someone engaged in a profession that requires certification (such as bengo-shi = CPA, or kyo-shi = teacher). To further complicate matters, the SHI part can be expressed by different kanji… each one (surprise!) conveying a different meaning. In case of nawa-shi the SHI kanji is the same as used in shi-sha (teacher). Sorry, it just so happens that in Japanese they have more than one word for sensei.
Terms of the trade: I happen to take private Japanese lessons with an old lady who is the owner/president of a Japanese language school. When I asked her about the meaning of nawashi I drew a complete blank. Your average vanilla person neither knows what nawashi means nor how to write it. On the other hand, every rope or BDSM person in Japan knows what it means and how to write it.
Putting it all together: As can be seen by the linguistic explanations above, a lot of cultural stuff is inherent in a lot of words. Considering this explanation, a nawashi is a person that has reached a certain degree of proficiency in handling nawa (rope)… therefore the SHI.
Basically, if you are called Nawashi in Japan you are considered doing good, solid rope work (and expectations/standards for that in Japan are quite high)… not just “play” rope
Some misinterpretation: This whole misconception in the West about Nawashi started when in the early days of (Yahoo!) AdultRopeArt I was privately asked what the meaning of Nawashi was. Naïve as I was, I answered “rope artist,” not expecting that this thing would go up on the internet in a way that everybody who plays with rope suddenly felt invited to call himself a Nawashi.
On (Yahoo!) ShibariNetwork , the other day I mentioned that cotton rope in Japan is called “men rope”, using katakana to write “rope” NOT nawa. Consequently a nawashi is not a guy that plays with cotton or any other rope, but rather with hemp (or better: jute). Promptly some wise-cracker feels obliged to change the world by claiming some internet dictionary does not make that distinction, drawing the conclusion that anybody using any sort of rope is a Nawashi… he and himself the foremost, no doubt.
Osada Steve
May 2005
(edited for readability, used with permission)
Disclaimer: In any case, I have just rattled this down in a few minutes because I am on a roll and have just elaborated on Shibari a few hours earlier. So all of you do me a favor and do NOT cross-post or quote me verbatim or out of context or at ALL on this.
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