New Video: History, Jiu Jitsu, and Maps with Ruadhan MacFadden

My second interview in my "Out on a Limb" episodes.

Lesson learned: Audio can be just as much of a hassle as video, man. My mic picked up everything including the rub against my shirt and the creak of my chair. His mic had the opposite problem; I was lucky he had a soothing baritone to make it a bit easier to catch. There was also a 1.5 to 2 second delay of my recording software. A great challenge, and I learned a lot.

I started with roughly 28 minutes of raw footage. That’s what happens when you get two nerds getting to talk about a confluence of things they love. Paring that down to 10 was the goal. I got pretty close, decided that the narratives fit after some rearranging, and dropped in some pictures to jazz up the visuals.

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Ruadhan MacFadden discusses his recent weaving of grappling, anthropology, and cartography for his podcast, A Hero of a Thousand Holds (www.thousandholds.net). Thus far, he has researched a broad range of folk-wrestling styles, Jiu Jitsu (both Japanese and Brazilian), Judo, and Sambo.

0:27 The 5 Maps (currently available!)

Grappling Around the World
Grasping Chaos
The Father of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu
Choke Points
Iron Roots

3:12 His Inspiration: A workshop at BJJ Globetrotters

7:26 The Problems of Dubious Sources and Historiography: Who can we trust as historians? Which sources are valid? Does a resource that offers another narrative disqualify your source and narrative?