Michael J. Hacker, M.A., is a budōka, student, teacher, musician, writer, linguist, U.S. Air Force veteran, amateur mad scientist, tech nerd, cybersecurity analyst, and native Iowan. He has spent the bulk of his life geeking out over languages and currently speaks almost no Arabic, very little Mandarin Chinese or German, a little more French, a lot more Russian, a whole lot more Japanese (although, he’s still trying to recover from his Tōhoku accent), and shocking little Spanish for someone who has lived 3 hours from Mexico for half his life.
He spent a decade—spanning two Emperors, three Presidents, and countless hairstyles—in Japan, training martial arts, studying the Japanese language and culture, and earning advanced black belts in tonkotsu ramen. In 1998, he relocated to Arizona to further his Budō studies with Jiyūshinkai founder C.E. Clark and the students of the Jiyūshinkan. Michael currently holds Jiyūshinkai 4th dan and is an instructor at the Renshinkan in Mesa, Arizona.
Michael is an alumnus of the Defense Language Institute and has a Master of Arts degree in Linguistics from Arizona State University. He has worked as a professional linguist and translator in multiple languages for various agencies of the U.S. government and currently works as an Information Security Officer.