How does the future look

[terryl965]

In Martial Art how does the future look from your eyes?

What over the next ten years will help grow the Arts?

Who do you see as the up and coming over the next ten years?

Which styles do you see as being on top in that some time frame?

 

[MJS]

In Martial Art how does the future look from your eyes?

I would imagine people will continue to train and spread the various arts to others.

What over the next ten years will help grow the Arts?

I suppose the above answer applies here as well. There are many people out there dedicated to the arts. Its those people who pass the arts on to others, their students pass it on, etc.

Who do you see as the up and coming over the next ten years?

People or arts? People: I really have no idea. I mean, look at something like the Ultimate Fighter. That show is about up and coming fighters. Many of them have moved on to actually have a chance to fight in the UFC.

Arts: Way too many to choose from.

Which styles do you see as being on top in that some time frame?

Thats debateable. Again, too many to pick from. Depending on how well known your art is, how well you spread the art, any number of them can be on top.

 

[terryl965]

Mike I about the UFC but beside them who else?

 

[Darth F.Takeda]

MMA is going to hurt Traditional arts in the perception of the average person.

People are allready of a mind that if you cant use it in the Octagon, it's not real.

Unless a big name UFC fighter runs afoul of a traditional artist and is killed by the artist. I think that will happen someday, these guys think they are the be all end all of fighting, they come across a Fillipino master and it's going to be lesson time.

RBSD will continue to get bigger.

Trad schools are going to have to add a RBSD flavour to their arts, if they want to atract serious SD students.

I'll just continue to meld JJJ,Judo and BJJ with FMA/IMA and not worry to much about everything else.

 

[Steel Tiger]

In Martial Art how does the future look from your eyes?

The future of the martial arts is very strong. I can see in the resurgence of interest in the history of the arts and the new developments in mixing and fusing arts as keeping the arts strong and vibrant for decades to come. We may see some new arts emerging as well.

What over the next ten years will help grow the Arts?

As much as some believe that TKD has lost its roots, I think that it and modern Wushu will keep martial arts in the general consciousness. Again, the current fondness for the history and roots of the arts will combine with the mass movements to keep smaller arts alive. We are not losing diversity in the arts. We are, in fact, increasing diversity as arts from different regions re-emerge.

Who do you see as the up and coming over the next ten years?

The people I see coming to be personalities in the arts are those from what I consider the three main growth areas of the arts - TKD, modern Wushu, and MMA. Unfortunately, while I can see these being the growth areas, they are also those areas of the arts that are leaving behind their roots to an extent.

Which styles do you see as being on top in that some time frame?

TKD has Olympic competition to offer as an incentive, so it is going to stay big for a long time. The Chinese government is seriously pushing modern Wushu as the future of CMAs, and have made it such a huge beast that it will cater to just about anybody. MMA offers a taste of realism. European arts are re-emerging and are finding a wide and enthusiastic audience.

It seems to me that traditional CMAs and JMAs are being overwhelmed and some major effort is going to be needed to keep them strong.

 

[grydth]

At least regionally, from what I see of my daughters' Goju-Ryu karate school, I'd expect continued growth. There's a really strong cadre of people, an enthusiastic attitude around the dojo.... and I am aware of others like this one. I see them thriving, and deservedly so, through the next decade in central New York.

Nationally, I fear Tai Chi is about to suffer the same fadish fame as befell Yoga and Pilates. This is no blessing, and most of the sheeple crowding us off the floor will be gone as soon as the next hot activity is announced. A plague of locusts, grumbles me....

The worst possible scenario is political interference. A barrage of crime or terrorism, a little media frenzy..... and we could wind up with other versions of New York's fundamentally irrational law on martial arts weapons. Whether its right wing repression or a left wing nanny state, there is always the threat of politicians telling us to: hand in our katanas before we put someone's eye out... stop that aikido before you break your neck....terrorists went to that karate dojo...you don't need FMA to defend yourself.... sorry, liability concerns prohibit that extreme Tai Chi.... stop teaching violence - after all, it's for the children.:barf:

 

[stone_dragone]

I think that youtube and other internet video outlets will continue to bring certain skillsets and styles to the public eye. In the 50's through the mid 80's books and a few magazines were the main media outlet for supplementing training.

80's to 90's saw a major increase in VHS (and later DVD's) as the primary supplementation method.

The 21st century will continue to see the Internet as a growing supplemental information source...I pray the day never comes that the internet, video or books become the Primary source of instruction, however.

 

[HKphooey]

I think things will come full circle. People will want to go back to some traditional values and history.

 

[exile]

I see the future of the MAs as brighter than it has been in a long time. Here's my thinking:

a brilliant group of historically very well-informed, non-authoritarian and experimentally-minded TMAists has emerged in the western world, centered in the UK but rapidly expanding elsewhere, who have (i) rediscovered the CQ street-defense roots of the TMAs and the crucial role of forms in encoding, in somewhat covert form, sensible and effective combat techniques, (ii) worked out realistic, non-compliant combat-sparring protocols for allowing practitioners to hone their fighting skills against untrained violent assailants with a minimum of time spent in hospital ERs, and (iii) have learned to write in a lucid, logically satisfying way that fully motivates their historical perspective (based on detailed knowledge of sources and a refusal to indulge in, or tolerate, a romantic mystification of the TMAs fed by mythmongering and legendary history) and logical analyses of kihon movements and the relationship between these movements on the one hand and combat moves on the other. The members of this group do serious research—empirically-based observations feeding formation of general principles—whose ultimate goal is the reduction of the bewildering variety of MA techs to the interaction of overarching strategies with biomechanical specifics. Once these principles are learned and fully understood, and the biomechanical conditions we have to work with given human skeletal and neurological facts, many tactical outcomes can be deduced directly from the formal patterns (kata, hyungs, hsings) of the TMAs. If these methods of application (derived from the forms by general principles and a systematic approach to interpreting pattern movements according to these principles) are trained under intensely realistic conditions as per (ii) above, the result will be confident, effective fighters capable of defending themselves as well in the 21st century as the small, elite group of Asian MAists who gave us the TMAs were able to do in the 19th and early 20th.

This realization has already led to a tremendous resurgence of interest in bunkai for TMA forms, and has provided both livelihoods and pulpits for MAists such as Iain Abernethy, Bill Burgar, Rick Clark, Patrick McCarthy, Stuart Anslow, Simon O'Neil and increasingly many others to both carry out their research and teaching in this area and to publicize their findings to a wider audience. The focus on various MAs, whether the CMAs, `traditional' karate, `old school' TKD/TSD, and others, will I think eventually lead to a profound break between the tournament competition-centered activities of a large group of MA institutions and practitioners, on the one hand, and the CQ SD-based training of a smaller, but equally devoted group of practitioners who see their arts as expressions of jutsu, rather than athletic performance or spectacle. And this latter group, I believe, will continue to grow well into the long-term future.

So, somewhat uncharacteristically, I'm completely optimistic about the future of the MAs...

 

[still learning]

Hello, First! The populations of the world today is a little over 6.3 billion people...in the next 10,20 years this fiqure will increase to over 9 billion people.

From what I understand? ....our resources will be decease of water, food, and other natural resources. NOT sure if the world populations have enought food, water & shelter? ...in 2018,2028

Due to overcrowding.....expect more violence, need to fight to keep what you have in the future?

I know this is NOT what you meant? ......Crimes in American will grow and more parole's more crime? ...never ending and always repeating...FBI statis shows 70% of crimes are committed by repeat offenders...who are getting out on paroles so easy now days.......keep training!

Aloha (Hawaii's population is a little over 1.3 million people living on 7 islands...and getting crowded too....) see map for size? ...very small place!

 

[MJS]

Mike I about the UFC but beside them who else?

If I had to guess, I'd have to say that the arts that have a high rate of competition will continue to move forward. Of course, this isn't to say that arts that don't put competing on a high scale, will fail.

 

[Kacey]

Hello, First! The populations of the world today is a little over 6.3 billion people...in the next 10,20 years this fiqure will increase to over 9 billion people.

From what I understand? ....our resources will be decease of water, food, and other natural resources. NOT sure if the world populations have enought food, water & shelter? ...in 2018,2028

Due to overcrowding.....expect more violence, need to fight to keep what you have in the future?

I know this is NOT what you meant? ......Crimes in American will grow and more parole's more crime? ...never ending and always repeating...FBI statis shows 70% of crimes are committed by repeat offenders...who are getting out on paroles so easy now days.......keep training!

Aloha (Hawaii's population is a little over 1.3 million people living on 7 islands...and getting crowded too....) see map for size? ...very small place!

Um.... what does this have to do with the original question about the future of Martial Arts? Is there a correlation here that I'm missing?

 

[Darth F.Takeda]

Um.... what does this have to do with the original question about the future of Martial Arts? Is there a correlation here that I'm missing?

To me he is pointing out the increasing need to study the arts in the future,it's going to get harder to posses weapons in some places in the future.

I do have a feeling I will make a decent living in the future teaching the over civilized how to dismantle his fellow man.

 

[newGuy12]

Right. In the coming police state, weapons will be confiscated.

Furthermore, the Arts will concentrate more on reality, to protect oneself. The harshness that lies ahead will make this necessary.

If it gets very bad, perhaps people will band together in "ryus" to protect each other!

 

[newGuy12]

The worst possible scenario is political interference. A barrage of crime or terrorism, a little media frenzy..... and we could wind up with other versions of New York's fundamentally irrational law on martial arts weapons. Whether its right wing repression or a left wing nanny state, there is always the threat of politicians telling us to: hand in our katanas before we put someone's eye out... stop that aikido before you break your neck....terrorists went to that karate dojo...you don't need FMA to defend yourself.... sorry, liability concerns prohibit that extreme Tai Chi.... stop teaching violence - after all, it's for the children.:barf:

Man, oh Man. If that's not the truth, I don't know what is!

 

[tellner]

We're in an unprecedented situation. Whatever you want you can find. Unless you try very hard you can't remain isolated. One of the good things is that this sort of ferment is the time when people get creative. It's also a time when deadwood gets pruned and things get tested. The ones that don't have it or can't adapt go away. The ones that had something real or can learn to make their stuff work against new challenges survive or at least contribute to the next cycle.

New doesn't mean good. Old doesn't mean good. Tradition is just stories and habits that have a patina from being handled for a long time. If they serve a useful purpose then G-d willing and the river don't rise some of it will be incorporated into whatever comes next. If they don't or the means and ends have parted ways the tradition is worthless and will die off like almost every martial arts style has.

The "traditionalists" pooh-pooh MMA. "What we do is too deadly, too pure, too steeped in the dust of centuries to sully itself with those crude brawlers. They'll come around, wear white pajamas, bellow the dojo kun and do our katas some day. Honest."

Today's knuckle draggers say "If you're so hot let's throw you into a cage with a twenty five year old Body Nazi who boxes and wrestles. You won't last a minute because your **** is weak."

What can you say to either set of fanatics? They've both got a glimmer or two of truth, and at least the Octagonal Revisionists are willing to walk their talk. But the flip side of the coin "How do you know if you haven't tried it?" is "Why reinvent the wheel every twenty years? We've already got a diagram and can throw in the idea of an axle, a brake and putting four of them around a box with a horse hitched up in front."

The traditional uses of old field-expedient weapons like the kama, nunchaku, oar and turtle-shell-and-big-knife is fading away. It's a shame that most of it won't be preserved. The idea of turning everyday objects into weapons is part of the martial arts world. It's just the particular objects that change. The shotel is the descendant of the kopesh. It's obscure and almost forgotten because we don't harvest teff with sickles anymore and live in the age of the AK-47. The Japanese don't spend as much time kneeling as they used to. In another generation one can expect that even Aikido will have de-emphasized the knee-walking portion of the program.

In the past the real advances have come during times of change and of increased interaction between cultures which didn't previously run into each other. Japan before the "Floating World" era was a nasty brutal place with wars, bandits and deadly squabbles between the nobility. A lot of important advances were made in the sciences of war. For the next few centuries afterwards there weren't wars, and civil unrest was put down efficiently. Then came the Black Ships. The times demanded a different school of fighting for a different era. Takeda gave way to Ueshiba. Juken Jutsu became more important.

The traditionalists piped up once. The new arts as exemplified by breech-loading guns turned them into hash before they could even get into bow range.

Bruce Lee and Edward William Barton-Wright were the MMA of their day. Traditional Arab and Russian martial arts came up against the superior skills of the Mongols with predictable results. What took their place was something different that was more applicable to the new conditions. Crusaders adopted Islamic arms and armor in the desert because the alternative was heatstroke.

Traditional Ju Jutsu met the new Kano Ju Jutsu (Judo) and was soundly thrashed. Of course Kano was already conversant in several older styles and used them as important parts of his new Art. When Judo traveled to Brazil it was adopted by the Gracie family and became a huge part of their family style. For a few years the Gracies reigned supreme. Then people started learning their tricks and how to counter them. The movement they started (this time around) has already changed; drop into the guard and wait for the other guy to make a mistake doesn't work nearly as well as it used to. But BJJ/GJJ will be a large part of what comes next.

That's the way the world works. That's (Lamarckian) evolution in action.

Right now we're in an unsettled period. The world has shrunk. The American Ascendancy is falling apart. If you want to find obscure European or African or Chinese-Indonesian martial arts you can do it.

It will be good for MA in general. The tropes are easy to recognize - the gi, the bowing, the Octagon, the mount. spinning kicks and so on. But it's also the age of the reality check. You can't get away with passing off horse apples as Golden Delicious anymore. People learn.

So here's what I think we're going to see...

There will be more martial arts in evidence everywhere. We'll see a lot of good stuff disappear in the same way that Sumatrans drink Nescafe and the Ethiopians are cutting down the scions of the original coffee bushes to plant khat; it's what all the cool kids do, and the cheap crap from Vietnam is cornering the market. Of course MMA and other reality-based sports and fighting systems will travel as well. The shift towards them will continue in new areas. People who do things simply because of tradition will find themselves marginalized. The world is changing, and "we've always done it this way, so sit down and shut up" doesn't push the same buttons it used to.

Along with that will be an increased market for Reality-Based Self Defense of one sort or another. Not that long ago everyone had the X-block, upward block, downward block and set-piece disarms. That was all you needed to know about knife defense. It turned out not to be true. And besides, the FMA showed up both in the sense of arriving and in the sense of showing up others' deficiencies. Eight or nine years ago almost nobody was talking about working on the ground. Now it is de rigeur. I don't see that changing. Multiple attackers is the next great marketing and "We always had that" frontier. Down the road it might be group tactics, but that's a long way away.

As the world, at least the English speaking part of it, has moved towards a more politically repressive and control-happy system there will be increasing calls for regulation and monitoring of anyone involved in what is seen as effective combatives. There will be plenty for the military and police. Arts which stress loyalty, patriotism, obedience and respect for authority will be smiled upon. Anything that teaches people to think for themselves or gives deadly skills to those un-vetted by the Powers that Be will be under increasing pressure.

I see science - exercise physiology, sports medicine and the like having more influence on training at least for the self defenser and the serious martial athlete (another effect of the growth of MMA sporting events).

The Mixed Martial Arts sports scene will continue to gain market share and total adherents. It's beginning to tap into the River of Money big time. There will be fads and fashions, but I can't see the mix of kickboxing and wrestling in the larger sense losing ground to much of anything in the near future. WWE will suffer. Small loss. Boxing will continue to circle the drain and wonder why.

Weapons arts like FMA and Silat will continue a slow steady growth. I don't see them getting all that big.

To the extent that they help people learn some of the older training methods like kata will get a boost. Since most teachers frankly never past step one or two in their understanding of how to use patterned movement it will be short-lived. Technique, form and training methods that are too culture-specific or done "just because" won't last long. Look for them to be modified and for the older stuff to provide sizzle for the practical sausage.

 

[MarkBarlow]

The only certainty is that something new and shiny will catch the public's attention. That's not to say that the current "hot" style isn't viable, just that fads come and go.
Since I began training in the 70s I've seen kung fu, jeet kune do, arnis/escrima, ninjutsu and BJJ all proclaimed to be the best thing since sliced bread. The m.a. media, whether it's magazines or the Web, have to promote some art above the rest. Where's the fun is saying that all arts have strengths and weaknesses and it's up to the individual to decide what works best for them? Heck no, pick a martial art and say that a white belt in this art can whip a black belt in any other martial art!

In the early 70s, it was not at all unusual to see karate/tkd schools offering kung fu and I'm sure that the TV show KUNG FU had nothing to do with it. It's the same way with BJJ. Pick up a phone book and look under Martial Arts and it's even money that at least one karate or tkd school in your area is also offer BJJ, whether the instructor is qualified or not.

Eventually, the fad dies down and something new takes its place. I'm still hoping to find someone to teach me Combat Tai Chi.

 

[grydth]

The only certainty is that something new and shiny will catch the public's attention. That's not to say that the current "hot" style isn't viable, just that fads come and go.
Since I began training in the 70s I've seen kung fu, jeet kune do, arnis/escrima, ninjutsu and BJJ all proclaimed to be the best thing since sliced bread. The m.a. media, whether it's magazines or the Web, have to promote some art above the rest. Where's the fun is saying that all arts have strengths and weaknesses and it's up to the individual to decide what works best for them? Heck no, pick a martial art and say that a white belt in this art can whip a black belt in any other martial art!

In the early 70s, it was not at all unusual to see karate/tkd schools offering kung fu and I'm sure that the TV show KUNG FU had nothing to do with it. It's the same way with BJJ. Pick up a phone book and look under Martial Arts and it's even money that at least one karate or tkd school in your area is also offer BJJ, whether the instructor is qualified or not.

Eventually, the fad dies down and something new takes its place. I'm still hoping to find someone to teach me Combat Tai Chi.

Do you feel these fads are of any benefit to the MA.... or simply something inevitable to be endured? I am dreading Tai Chi becoming a new fad.

Don't want to divert the thread, but I'd beware of anyone offering "Combat Tai Chi" to new students. The only way I received instruction in the martial applications - and it was bruising instruction - was to study the form for about a year, pass a proficiency test, wait and practice solo several months, go through the form again - from the beginning - to polish every posture.... only then would the sifu teach self defense applications.

 

[Steel Tiger]

Do you feel these fads are of any benefit to the MA.... or simply something inevitable to be endured? I am dreading Tai Chi becoming a new fad.

Don't want to divert the thread, but I'd beware of anyone offering "Combat Tai Chi" to new students. The only way I received instruction in the martial applications - and it was bruising instruction - was to study the form for about a year, pass a proficiency test, wait and practice solo several months, go through the form again - from the beginning - to polish every posture.... only then would the sifu teach self defense applications.

I actually think we are living in the Tai Chi fad now. It is running parallel to the reality-based competition fad. Unfortunately the Tai Chi fad is driven by the new age community and I can only see that growing in the future. Real taiji may really suffer from this and the strange emphasis coming from the Chinese government with regard to taiji in modern Wushu.

 

[still learning]

Um.... what does this have to do with the original question about the future of Martial Arts? Is there a correlation here that I'm missing?

Hello, The more people around you? the more chances we will need to learn some kind of martial art to protect ourselves.

In a small town...mostly likely less troubles,bullies,bad guys....in a major city the problems increase's.

In a crowded world? .....problems will increase as the populations grow! There fore more people would want to learn.

2nd....traditional martial art will fall back? ...because people want to learn REAL self-defence that works....and be train in a very short period of time! (New wave of training/learning will be found)

Like old computers? .....the old ways will be obsolete.....because the NEW ways of learning things faster will be found!

3. Kata's will NO longer be USE because they found it is not a great training tool! (see seals training, Krav Magv,Kick boxing,MMA's etc)

4, You ask what I thinK? ....The future of Martial arts will change to be a shorter and more effective, with real real robots,and similations training from computers- like Airlines training in the box!

5.Hopefully crime and bad guys will have stricter sentences in the future?

6. Some people will still keep some tradition ways (just a few).....Many will change to the NEW WAVE!