Hi Bao!
Sorry for the late answer! I have no freetime in the last days to write...
[quote ]... while in xiaojia there are lots of possibly centers, or (if you want) a continously changing center.
Well, that was certainly an interesting thought, something I haven't heard about before. Is it about the three different Dan Tian, shoulder/scapula movement or something else? Maybe you could develop it? [/quote]
It is about the joints. Every joint of the body can be a center of movement. The dajia way of movement develop one strong basis (center) of the movement what is usually somewhere close to the dantian area. Some use a pont inside the body usually the middle dantian, some use a point in front of the body. The concept of this kind of movement is that the person is like a ball, and his movements are like the ball rotating or rolling, with a fix center.
Those who place this center in front of his belly use a concept where the person an his "enemy" make a ball together and the center of his movements similar to the center of this ball. This way in the form the hands represent the enemy as one half of the ball, and your own torso is the other half o this ball. This concept is quite common in the chenjiagou forms.
In xiaojia this conceptual ball is not one big ball, but lots of smaller one, where there is a contact with the enemy, there will be a center of this ball and in this way there will be a center of the movement.
In the Kai/He part you are right of course. What I have tried to say is that the dajia usually uses a more open body. They emphasize more the opening. They use much bigger movements to open up the body. Usually the stances are wilder the movements are bigger but not necessary deeper than in xiaojia…
In xiaojia the body is more “solid” or closed. The stances are narrower, the movements are smaller but not necessary higher than in dajia…
Both of these concepts or methods can deliver the practioner to an understanding of Kai/He naturally, But the way, they use are different.
So, maybe I was easily misunderstood, since my English is not the best and I not always use the right phrases, but all I wanted to say that the different is not in the deepness or highness of the stances…
Sophisticated? If you call commercialising sophisticated that is... That is almost everything the Taiji stylists was doing by that time, Chen or Yang, -they were trying to make business out of their art and put their own name into the CMA history.
You are a little bit sceptic aren’t you?
Örs