Empowerment Self Defense
What is Empowerment Self-Defense?
Empowerment self-defense (ESD) is a comprehensive, evidence-based, and trauma-informed approach to personal safety training that provides a variety of tools to address the spectrum of violence from verbal harassment to life-threatening situations.
At its core, ESD empowers individuals, within their social and cultural contexts, to prevent, resist, and recover from violence. Through holistic and multimodal methodologies, individuals learn to expand their awareness, assess their options, recognize threatening behavior, assert boundaries, de-escalate heightened situations, escape to safety, and physically defend themselves. Instructors may use a variety of activities, games, full-force drills, role-play scenarios, guided discussions, or other embodied and active learning processes to teach through strengths and successes rather than fear and weaknesses.
Unlike most martial arts and non-empowerment self-defense classes, ESD students learn empowerment-based communication, violence prevention, and avoidance skills alongside physical strike training. Some ESD instructors teach through the mnemonic device of Think, Yell, Run, Fight, Tell (see The 5 Principles of Self-Defense https://www.esdglobalselfdefense.org/whatisesd); some organizations teach with padded instructors practicing realistic scenarios (see Impact chapters worldwide); and yet other instructors and organizations teach with both proprietary and open source curricula. While there are many ways to teach Empowerment Self-Defense, not all self-defense training uses ESD principles. For more information, see Sexual Assault Risk Reduction and Resistance: Theory, Research, and Practice, chapter 10 by Jocelyn Hollander: https://jocelynhollander.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/ESD-paper-pdf.pdf.
ESD instructs simple to learn, easy to remember, and powerful to use skills that anyone can acquire within a few hours rather than with years of practice. The training effectively uses brain and behavioral sciences to complement our neurobiological and natural stress reactions (such as fight, flight, freeze) helping individuals to respond in adrenalizing and activating situations. With a focus on expanding rather than restricting participants’ choice, options, and agency, ESD combats myths about violence and who can access self-defense, addresses interpersonal and domestic violence, and aligns with movements for social and political change including advocating for social justice.
Differentiated from other forms of self-defense and martial arts training, ESD instruction:
- Recognizes those who experience violence do not cause, invite, ask for, or deserve to be attacked, harassed, or abused (only perpetrators are accountable);
- Honors and respects any decisions made in the moment to survive, be it before or after taking a class (non victim-blaming);
- Does not tell students what they should do when something happens, instead it offers a range of tools, recognizing participants are the experts in their own lives (non prescriptive);
- Is trauma-aware, acknowledging that trauma is wide-spread, shows up in the body, and can be activated through self-defense practice (trauma-informed);
- Can be adapted for any body type, ability level, age, culture, and life experience (inclusive);
- Offers options, techniques, skills, and strategies that strengthen decision-making, break through denial, and increase confidence;
- Teaches to the individual instead of expecting the individual to conform to the teaching; and makes space for student voices and experiences.
Furthermore, ESD courses are globally adaptive: taking into consideration cultural and social context, addressing intersectional identities, responding to a variety of scenarios, and able to be taught in any language. Instructors drawn to teach ESD are diverse, located worldwide, and driven to support violence prevention in their community. More often than not, ESD instructors are women or marginalized individuals, and they may be trauma survivors themselves. Instructors come from any number of aligned modalities or careers, including martial arts; yoga, tai chi, and other healing arts; personal trainers or other movement coaches; social workers or therapists; domestic and sexual violence providers; school or university teachers; NGO, non-profit, or government workers in helping fields; and more.
While the contemporary form of Empowerment Self-Defense training was fashioned out of the second-wave feminist movement of the 1960s and 1970s in the United States (Her Own Hero: The Origins of the Women’s Self-Defense Movement by Wendy L. Rouse https://nyupress.org/9781479828531/her-own-hero/), all ESD training is a descendant of grass-roots self-defense practices created by women and other marginalized people who forever have sought to combat interpersonal and community violence (see https://www.esdprofessionals.org/history-of-womens-self-defense/). Today, ESD training has evolved to include a wide range of styles and inclusive methods that make it more relevant to diverse and international participants. While ESD still successfully serves cis-gender women, many instructors are using the core principles and empowerment model to provide courses to men, children and teens of all genders, LGBTQIA2S+ and non-binary people, People of Color worldwide, refugees and immigrants, trauma survivors, older adults, and people with a range of disabilities, ability levels, and body types.
Rooted in evidence, ESD is the only self-defense training modality with a body of research supporting efficacy. Through multiple studies, it has been proven that ESD reduces rates of victimization and the risk of assault, increases confidence and self-efficacy while decreasing fear and anxiety, and contributes to healing from trauma.
See the below for more about research into the efficacy of ESD:
https://www.jocelynhollander.com/empowerment-self-defense-frequently-asked-questions-faq/