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Japanese for aikido
The terms that come up constantly in an aikido dojo: roles, entering and turning, the main techniques, and the etiquette words spoken at the start and end of practice.
Aikido leans on its Japanese vocabulary more heavily than most martial arts, and many of the words describe a direction or principle rather than a fixed move.
Roles and the basics
うけみ is arguably the first real skill in aikido: you spend as much time being thrown as throwing. The word means “receiving body” - it frames falling as an active skill rather than a failure.
Movement principles
いりみ and てんかん are the two halves of nearly every aikido technique - you either enter or you turn. Instructors often name a technique by which of the two it uses, so catching these two words tells you the shape of the movement before you see it.
Common techniques
いっきょう through ごきょう (ikkyō to gokyō) are literally “first teaching” to “fifth teaching” - the numbered core controls. When you hear にきょう (nikyō) you know it's the second in that series, which is a helpful map of the syllabus.
Start and end of class
あいきどう breaks down as あい (ai, harmony) + き (ki, energy/spirit) + どう (dō, way) - “the way of harmonising energy”. It's a fair summary of what the techniques are trying to do: blend with force rather than meet it.
These phrases get built into real conversation in the90 day course. The first week needs no account.