Our history

Okinawa is the home of Karate.

The legendary Matsumura Sokon taught a number of students who became in turn “great”  practitioners of karate, including Azato, Itosu, Ishimine and Tawada.

Itosu is the most famous and most readily recognised of these “greats”. He in turn taught many students who became famous karate practitioners. Some went to Japan – Funakoshi, Mabuni, Toyama. Some stayed in Okinawa – Yabe (Yabu), Hanashiro, Yamakawa (Yamagawa), Yabiku, Tokuda, Oshiro, Chibana, Ausukuma.

Hiroshi Kinjyo was a pupil too and studied under a number of Itosu’s students.

Sadaharu Fujimoto Sensei (8th Dan) studied under Kinjyo. He became Kinjyo’s most senior and experienced student until he formed his own ryu (school), International Karate-do Shobukai (IKS), in Tokyo.

Shihan Graham Keleher founded the Australian Academy of Martial Arts in Mt. Gravatt, Brisbane, in the early 1970s.  Shihan Keleher (7th Dan) studied under Fujimoto Sensei from the early1980s and was appointed Head of IKS in Australia.

Forty years later, the Academy with Head of Style, Sensei Michael Howe 5th Dan, still maintains strong links with the Honbu (Head) Dojo of IKS, now headed by Sensei Harutaka Fujimoto, 7th Dan, son of Sensei Sadaharu Fujimoto.

Senior students and instructors of AAMA undertake regular training weeks at the Honbu Dojo of IKS. AAMA’s senior instructors undertake regular training weeks at the Honbu Dojo of KARATE-DO SHOBUKAI in Japan.