The Silver Spring sensei who carved space for women in martial arts

When Grandmaster Carol Middleton wasn’t wearing a traditional taekwondo uniform — which was most of the time — she was always decked out head to toe in pink.

Her hat. Her sunglasses. Her fingernails. Her fanny pack. Her sneakers.

It’s not the look one might expect from a martial arts master, but nothing about the longtime Silver Spring resident was typical, former students said. Keen to break boards and societal norms, Middleton was a leading voice in feminist self-defense in the D.C. region and beyond. Over about five decades in the field, she pushed thousands of women across the country to get stronger and smarter, loved ones said.

“The fact that she has students who still call her their revered sensei means she was doing a lot of things right,” said Nancy Lanoue, an industry colleague who met Middleton in the 1970s.

Middleton, founder of the D.C. Self Defense Karate Association, died Aug. 11 of dementia complications. She was 78.

She was born Jan. 11, 1948, and grew up in St. Louis and Arkansas. As a child, Middleton was “skinny, frail, shy, unconfident and uncoordinated,” she wrote in her 2020 book, “Lessons of the Masters: Life Skills Developed in Martial Arts.” She avoided confrontations and didn’t speak up for herself. But karate changed that.

She took her first martial arts class in Oklahoma in 1968, slowly gaining strength and flexibility. She started training in taekwondo, a Korean martial art and sport, the next year. She was the only woman in a 70-person class, former students said.

She then moved to Wisconsin, where she continued practicing and founded the University of Wisconsin Karate Club. She moved to Silver Spring in 1975 to train under Ki Whang Kim, a widely respected martial artist who had studied in Korea. A year later, she established the D.C. Self Defense Karate Association.

Middleton hosted self-defense workshops, demonstrations and community events, mostly in Northwest D.C. Students flocked in from all over the area to be a part of the association, whose motto was “Discipline, respect and positive expectancy.” She walked the walk, always demanding more of herself than of her students and training at the gym at 5 a.m. five or six days a week, former students said.

Lauren Taylor, who has lived in Montgomery County for over four decades, first met Middleton in 1985. She was in her late 20s, contemplating quitting her job to travel. A friend suggested she take a self-defense class to protect herself during her trips.

Taylor appreciated that Middleton hosted community classes. Signing a contract at a dojo seemed like too much commitment, and her goal wasn’t really fitness. Middleton’s straightforward self-defense sessions were the perfect fit.

Taylor always assumed there was nothing she could do if someone tried to attack her, especially if they were bigger and stronger. But Middleton taught her she had options and skills to stop someone from hurting her.

“It freed up my whole life because I wasn’t constrained by the fear,” Taylor said.

When she returned from her travels, she took the class again. She was eager to learn more advanced skills, so she signed up for martial arts school.

Middleton didn’t just teach technique. She taught real-life skills in the context of real threats to women — and not just physical ones. She offered classes on boundary-setting and de-escalation, “because most things that happen, you don’t need to hit somebody,” Taylor said.

There were almost no women studying taekwondo when Middleton started, and she wanted to change that. She wasn’t precious about particular styles and invited teachers to demonstrate other forms of martial arts in her classes, Taylor said. She employed “success-based learning” strategies, which emphasize the importance of skill mastery over strict schedules.

But above all, Taylor said, she was just a good teacher. She continued hosting community classes, where people would just come into her dojo off the street with no martial arts experience. She’d have them doing roundhouse kicks in under 10 minutes, Taylor said.

“She just knew how to take apart a skill and hand it to you in pieces and scaffold it to make people successful,” she said.

Former students described Middleton as a pioneer of feminist self-defense, often called empowerment self‑defense. The idea is that most traditional advice that women receive in dangerous situations “makes your life smaller,” Taylor said — don’t wear a ponytail, don’t park next to a van, don’t wear a short skirt.

“Empowerment self-defense makes your life bigger,” Taylor said. “It’s a toolbox of skills that you gain by being in the classroom, and you are in charge of which ones you decide to pull out and use.”

Middleton also founded the D.C. chapter of IMPACT, a national full-force self-defense program, in 1988. In these classes, students simulate a real-life attack with people wearing pads so they can use all their strength.

She continued learning and teaching other forms of martial arts. From 2001 to 2016, she led Krav Maga DC.

“Those workshops that Carol led through her work with IMPACT certainly helped thousands of women survivors of assault heal from that assault and feel that they could live a big, bold life afterwards as a result of her helping them move through that trauma,” said Lanoue, who also owns a karate studio in Chicago.

She remembers Middleton always taking classes at martial arts conferences — not just teaching them. That was unusual.

“She just had a deep passion and a deep love of learning,” Lanoue said.

Former students are planning a memorial service for next spring.

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