The Demise of Traditional Martial Arts

[shifu]

I recently began to wonder as to the future of traditional Martial arts. Frankly speaking, it appears dismal.

One only need look to our popular culture and the many MA magazines which now are filled with RBSD.

Vewry few promote the TMA from a practical and or even cultural basis. Many Traditional schools are unable or unwilling to change with the times. The situation in China is that Modern Wushu is all the go and it seems the same in Japan and Okinawa where baseball seems more popular!

I would argue that three factors representing a great threat to the preservation of traditional fightings arts (yes that's what they truly are). The first is modern trends away from the cultural and philosophical aspects of the TMA and their inherent practical applications as witnessed in our media. The second is ignorance. Most people could not tell Kung-Fu from Chinese folk dancing. Martial artists worldwide perpetuate this myth by promoting images that have nothing to do with the real arts. The last is even more insidious, the con-men and fakes that trouble all arts.

Part of the reason I see for the general demise of the TMA and in particular Chinese Martial Arts is that most of the traditional martial artists themselves remain (largely by choice) cocooned from the mainstream martial arts world.

Some like myself, are attempting to open up a once closed door art, showcasing its benefits and hopefully contributing in some small way to its survival into the future.

As for practicality, I cannot speak for other arts but I think some would be very surprised at the applications of some of the TMA, they are not as impractical as some would believe and in fact have a lot in common with RBSD! My particular art has an element of change inherent within. To the traditional Chinese martial artist and art the element of change and creativity is an important one as they believe that the art is dead without it.

I cannot speak for Karatedo in all its forms as I'm no longer involved in that world but Chinese martial arts are my passion and the path I have decided to walk upon.

As stated earlier most Traditional Chinese Martial Arts (and I mean Traditional in the very sense of the word) have an element of change built within. The mentality of the arts is creative. The mentality of learning is to feel and gain the essence of the art. It is this "essence: that is important and that which must be understood , not setting the art into concrete but letting the essence of the art grow a, change with the needs of society and grow. The art is creative. After one has learnt and practiced for a long time. then one should blend the art with one's own ideas to make the art even greater.

The art is alive an creative. To Chinese philosophy if an art is not creative, then that art is dead.

Returning the thread to its original point, the traditional arts are currently in decline, most of the true traditional teachers of the arts remain cocooned from the current martial arts world by either a matter of choice, tradition or cultural considerations. This is especially true of my own art of White Crane Gongfu/Wushu. It is only via my efforts to bring my master's art "out" into the world that the art may survive, adapt and hopefully grow.

Otherwise, the arts will die out and then what will we be left with?

RSBD and CQB are part of the unique thing we call martial arts. What makes me wince is that some of the practitioners of these arts wear traditional Dogi and Obi or Traditional Kung-Fu dress and sashes, call there "art" by some Asian inspired name yet claim to have no link to the art form they are imitating in their promotion of the art they teach. We have all seen these types grace the pages of our favourite magazines. This adds further to the denigration of the true traditional essence of the traditional arts.

My question is, what can be done to ensure the survival and growth of the traditional arts?

 

[Jai]

That is a great question, and honestly and sadly, we live in a world where the answer my very well be "There is nothing we can do"

I remember when I started as a white belt, my instructor told me that for every 19 students that walk into a Dojo, one of them, ONE! will reach the rank of one dan. For every 50 one dans world wide, one of them will reach two dan. That was over twenty years ago, and today I'm sure the numbers aren't any better, if not worse.
Our world is evolving in a manor in which traditions are tossed aside for the "newest" and "best" thing to come along. Martial Arts as a whole I think is the biggest aspect to suffer because of this.

The best thing there is to do, is to instill the youth with the traditional values that Martial Arts was founded one, to make them understand why we bow, why we do this, why we say that, and so on. e may be fighting a losing battle and it breaks my heart to even consider that, but I'm going to go down swinging, and if I can touch just a handful of people, and pass along traditions and values I learned coming up in the ranks, and they can in turn do the same, maybe the battle won't be lost in a world of XBox, Ebay, fast cars, and fly by night mock values paid for by a corporate sponsor.

 

[exile]

Shifu, I want to play devil's advocate for a bit. Why on earth would you expect `traditional martial arts' to survive, when the traditional societies that they were part of, and which they arose in out of practicial necessity, have also essentially vanished?

In feudal societies where the only real law lay in the number of men-at-arms under your command, peasants and townpeople had to rely on themselves for security in a way largely unimaginable to us. The association of Asian monasteries with MA skills is hardly surprising: they were relatively wealthy places in eras in which armed bands of `masterless men', petty brigands hoping to set up as local warlords, and the like would surely have look greedily at any undefended and prosperous property. Fantasy-legends about Bhodidharma and the like notwithstanding, it's very likely that the rigorous MA training of warrior monks and so on was a perfectly rational training necessitated by the nasty circumstances of the time. The same thing happened in other parts of the world: the monasteries and abbeys of mediæval Dordogne, for example, are indistinguishable from small-scale fortresses... because that's what they were. Fighting systems exist when people need to be able to fight, no?

Things are so different in modern Asian society from the conditions that gave rise to the various unarmed combat systems we call the TMAs that it's almost impossible to fully describe the contrasts. Large-scale police forces and judicial enforcement of law and order, the availability of weaponry, thorough modernization... the list goes on and on. The societies which produced the TMAs have undergone convulsive change and development over the past several hundred years. If the conditions which led to the creation of these martial systems are ancient history, why would you expect that the fighting arts themselves would go on as though the world that provided a basis for them still existed??

OK: that said, I think you're worrying unnecessarily. While everything I was just saying is I believe true, the fact is that these traditional systems can maintain a kind of second life, if there are enough people who want to see them preserved. They'll be, relatively speaking, museum pieces, in a way, but they'll be kept alive as long as people practice them in earnest. There are millions of people out there who are interested in the MAs, and out of those millions, a small minority will want to pursue the kind of martial practices you're talking about. I was recently reading about some board game from the Middle Ages, can't remember its name, that was all the rage in the 11th c.... and apparently has an international federation, with almost half a million members who play this incredibly obscure game! No matter what it is, someone will want to do it, and will do it if shown how.

And that's the point: they have to be shown how. Do you want to preserve the MAs according to your vision? Then stop worrying about them, get down to work, gain the competence and credibility you need to become a teacher of your art, and then work hard to pass it, and your vision of it, on to a few worthy students (or more, if they show up). Hand-wringing about the degenerate times we live in will get you precisely nowhere. Teach the art according to your vision to those who want to learn it, show them why your vision of it is the right one... and you'll have gone a long way towards preventing the worst-case scenario you've described from happening. I mean... what else can you do? Nothing else is going to have the effect you desire, right? So make up your mind to see to it that things don't go the way you're afraid they will... that's all anyone can do!

 

[Steel Tiger]

I'm not so pessimistic about the fate of the TMAs. I agree there are definite problems but there are also very positive things happening as well. The 'rediscovery' of European traditional arts I think will have a follow on effect that will lead people to investigate the depth of Asian TMAs.

People are going to find they want more from their art than just the ability to defend oneself or annihilate another person. This will lead people back toward TMAs. I, too am firmly situated in the Chinese arts (bagua actually) and can see that modern Wushu will be a barrier.

There are things we can do as well. It is not necessary to teach a TMA in a strictly traditional manner. The traditions and knowledge are not in the teaching method but in the art itself. I think that one thing that puts people off with TMAs is a strict adherence to rigid, enforced discipline training methods. They are not necessary to teach the TMAs.

The desire of people to know more about their arts has spawned an intense interest in the history and traditions and technical details of many arts, especially those that have developed a strong sports aspect like TKD.

I like to think that the TMAs are not disappearing, but are coming out of a period of disinterest.

 

[Drac]

My question is, what can be done to ensure the survival and growth of the traditional arts?

I believe that there will always be teachers that will shun the new stuff in favor of the old ways...

 

[still learning]

Hello, Welcome to the world of ever changing! There will always be those who believe and love the traditional ways.

There will be those who want changes for the modern era's or times....JKD has made changes to way we look at martial arts.(in our time).....than came BJJ...which also create new changes in learning martial arts. (grappling).

All those things have been around for ages....just that "what seems old" ? ...again seems new? like Kava Magv...Russian arts? BJJ? , JKD?

Kinda like reinventing the wheel? ........Who knows what the next new martial art will be call ...the new wave?

It does seems like the traditional art is fading because of these new type of MMA schools....and many traditional schools are adding to there system because the newer students today want MORE.

In our system at Universal....every year we have NEW materials,new techniques, or a new ways of doing the same thing! New excerises,training methods, etc....always something new each year! ..........Aloha

 

[Logan]

Traditional arts are not dying any time soon. They may become less popular but there will always be a core of people maintaining the tradition. Many TMAs are recognised for their cultural value as well as health/self-defence benefits, so if they were ever in danger of dying out, endorsement or support is always around the corner. Fads come and go but anything considered "traditional" these days is here to stay.

Many people may wish to "improve" upon tradition, though I am often skeptical of this when it comes to technique improvement (not strength, flexbility, or endurance training though). Few people these days would have even a fraction of the experience that the people who developed traditional martial arts.

 

[terryl965]

I believe that there will always be teachers that will shun the new stuff in favor of the old ways...

Me too Drac and to me that is a great thing to have. There should be a mixture between new ways and old to make a great transtition into the MA world.

 

[Cirdan]

The Traditional arts won`t die because we can`t fill the Dojo with people who want to try the latest thing and then leave after a few months. They will die when we fail to train the next generation of instructors. As long as a certain quality is maintained and the art is allowed to grow as well as being preserved, the future looks bright. Those students that really want to master a Traditional art will find us.

 

[ChingChuan]

One only need look to our popular culture and the many MA magazines which now are filled with RBSD.

Uhm, isn't a MA always reality based self defense? My definition of traditional martial arts is something like 'a martial art which is taught on a traditional way and which teaches traditional values from country x'. However, to me it doesn't say anything about the quality of the art itself - I am sure that very strict & tradition schools can still teach their students techniques that would do very well on the street...
So I don't really understand what the fuss is about... The arts have survived the introduction of guns and bombs, so why shouldn't they survive this age too? Maybe some arts are truly dying out, but I am sure that lots of arts have already disappeared... Also, in the past, martial arts weren't as well known as they are now - so there were even less people who were interested in them. Now we've got the internet, more and more people get ot know what real martial arts are like. Of course, there are Mc dojo's, but there are still quite some people who know (and who want to know) the real thing...

 

[shesulsa]

I still see the core traditional values that power TMAs alive and well in other venues at the amateur levels, such as team sports and performing arts, major businesses; established hierarchy/rank, mutual consideration and respect, the value of graded progress, practice and drill, delayed gratification, teamwork, individual talent value, hard work for long periods of time, character development, etcetera.

In fact, these tenets are considered to be the building blocks of success.

Yet, I also see the glorification of immediate gratification, the praise of automatic entitlement, the pontification of the self, the demand to get more for less, the hero worship of thugs, snobs and idiots ... and I have to wonder the same thing.

Where are we going?

I don't know where everyone else is going, but I'm going back to my dojang and I'm going to put on my BELT. I'm going to bow back to the people who bow to me and thank them immediately afterward. I'm going to offer the ones I think are ready what knowledge I have that is appropriate for them at their level. I'm going to use the methods that transformed me from a wet-behind-the-ears self-righteous know-it-all to the person I am now, and hope that a few will follow and carry their own torch, lead someone else's path.

I'm going to watch them, listen to them, work with them, analyze them and I'm going to learn from them. Occasionally, I'm going to yell at them or ask for pushups. When they fix something, I'm going to find something else for them to fix.

I OWE it to them to give them measured doses whether they like it or not. I OWE it to them to cut them down and build them back up. I OWE it to them to take my responsibility far more seriously than they do their 100+ jumping jacks.

As long as there are some of us who have lives changed by TMA, there will be people teaching TMA. Just remember - everything trends.

 

[MJS]

Great thread!!:ultracool

Many very good points have been brought up. IMHO, I don't think that any art is at risk of vanishing any time soon. There are dedicated teachers and students in every art, so I'm sure they'll continue to grow. How much they grow is another story though. As the OP said, many arts refuse to come out of their box and explore other things. This is one thing that could result in the demise of TMAs.

IMHO, an art can still maintain traditional values, but still keep with the times. Training with swords, bo staff, etc. is fine, but it should also contain realistic modern weapons work as well. After all, nobody walks around dressed in full body armor, carrying a sword anymore.

Many people like to jump from art to art. Its a fad, something new, so people jump on the bandwagon. Look at when a new body style of a car comes out. Same thing, everyone stands in line to get one. Now, I don't think you should have to abandon your base art because the new flavor of the month came out, but I see nothing wrong with a little cross referencing of other arts. If you want to cross train, thats fine too, but at the least, learn how another art works. Look at your defenses. Is your takedown defense going to work against someone who does BJJ? If not, it may be a good idea to do some training with a grappler.

 

[bushidomartialarts]

I don't agree that the TMA are vanishing. You see the RBSD fad right now, the MMA just before it. Before that it was Taebo, before that Taekwondo, Ninjutsu before that....

The fads come and go. They didn't kill TMA then, they won't now.

 

[Steel Tiger]

I don't agree that the TMA are vanishing. You see the RBSD fad right now, the MMA just before it. Before that it was Taebo, before that Taekwondo, Ninjutsu before that....

The fads come and go. They didn't kill TMA then, they won't now.

Exactly. There is depth and mystery in TMAs that keep people coming back to them. These new packages are nothing but bare bones, the skeleton of a style if you like. It doesn't surprise me that so many people move from one to another. I think they are looking for a completion that is not present in these made to order pragmatic 'real' programs.

Its not about, "does the style have grappling or high kicks?" It is about a broader understanding of what it means to participate in a martial art. MMA is about competition, RBSD is about the maximum effect from the minimum training. Neither is a bad thing, its just not the whole thing. Its just a part.

Give me traditional arts everytime. They have all that I want and a bunch of other stuff I didn't even know I wanted.

 

[thardey]

Ahh, the "Good old days" when tradition was taught traditionally . . . whatever that means.

Seriously, though, TMA has survived this long. Wars, fads, fiction, McDojo's, self-pontification, bogus rank, lineage arguments, RBSD, sport fighting, etc. etc. are not new problems brought in by the turn of the millennium. They've just existed in different forms.

Instead of the latest blockbuster movie, people used to have folk tales and newspapers to spread the latest fad. There have always been teachers willing to prostitute their teaching to make a buck. There has always been the questions asked in training about "will this work when my neck is on the line?"

When it comes down to it, the human body only transfers energy in so many ways. There's always the questions about "hard" vs. "soft", or aggressive vs. defensive, or whatnot, but, when it comes down to empty-hand fighting, joints bend the same way they have for thousands of years, muscles are only capable of generating so much speed, or strength, and physics don't change.

Now if you're talking about "traditional methods of teaching", well, how do we know that we're teaching traditionally? Are belt ranks traditional? Is learning an art in a foreign language traditional? Is competing in tournaments traditional? Are training contracts traditional? Yes and no. These are the things that may not be done traditionally in the future.

At my dojo, we bow and shake hands. It's formal, but not traditional. Should we stop shaking hands? Or stop bowing? It's rather redundant, y'know?

Which brings up a question -- are teaching methods considered traditional because we have ancient teaching methods handed down, or are they traditional because they are more formal?

 

[still learning]

Hello, When you study the old "Masters"....they went thru changes...set up their style....which many follow today.

If those "Masters" were around today? ...I am sure they would have change many things in their systems today!

Traditions are good....martial arts is always involving and changing....to live in the past and NOT change to ever NEW modern ways.....will fall behind.

(example: we still practice useing Nunchaku....many because it is traditional.....yet for the modern world of USA...it is outlaw to carry and use it!

Aloha ...just my thoughts..

 

[grydth]

Like Shifu, I made the migration to Chinese martial arts from karate. I think this an excellent thread. However, I see the future of TMA more positively.

Perhaps we should first consider the future of traditional Chinese arts with some humility. Shifu writes from Australia and I from New York, USA - fine countries with dedicated practitioners to be sure, but the cradle of Chinese Arts is..... China.

I would humbly submit that if we here all quit, and instead became slavish followers of Madonna and Paris inspired trends, that the many millions of practitioners in China would keep things alive and quite well.

Traditional martial arts in China have faced, and survived, so many prior formidable challenges - the monstrous Japanese invasion, the Civil War, the Cultural Revolution and the advent of Wushu. Indeed, some of the harshest competition came from... other traditional martial arts.

Here, I do not see a major competition between say, Krav Maga and Tai Chi. Each will appeal to mostly a different group of potential students. Indeed, needs/conditions/abilities/preferences between individuals differing so widely, I feel we are better served having both TMA and RBMA available.

exile is indeed correct in asserting that the societies which gave birth to TMA have passed on.... but I would contend that in order to not become extinct ourselves, we will have to rediscover and embrace the old values. This shallow media driven thing we live in here is not enough to sustain meaningful life in the long term...

I would not be surprised in the least to see a number of RB practitioners coming to traditional masters for meaning, values and philosophy. There are sound reasons why those values were preserved and taught along with the techniques.

 

[Steel Tiger]

Which brings up a question -- are teaching methods considered traditional because we have ancient teaching methods handed down, or are they traditional because they are more formal?

I think that a lot of people see formal training methods as traditional simply because they look like they are from the 'old days'. But, speaking from a CMA point of view, the traditional training method is one on one or teaching a small group. Large schools are really a product of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (like the Chin Woo Athletic Association founded in 1910). But that's nearly 100 years ago so maybe its traditional now. Who knows?

It is difficult to pin down exactly what might be an ancient training method that has passed through the ages, so it is difficult to say what is traditional and what is not. Unfortunately, a lot of people think that lording it over and bullying students is traditional and the way the old masters did it.

As I have said before, I actually think that traditional martial arts are bullet-proof. They continue to survive and even thrive regardless of the latest "best most devastating art" to come and then go.

 

[thardey]

I think that a lot of people see formal training methods as traditional simply because they look like they are from the 'old days'. But, speaking from a CMA point of view, the traditional training method is one on one or teaching a small group. Large schools are really a product of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (like the Chin Woo Athletic Association founded in 1910). But that's nearly 100 years ago so maybe its traditional now. Who knows?

It is difficult to pin down exactly what might be an ancient training method that has passed through the ages, so it is difficult to say what is traditional and what is not. Unfortunately, a lot of people think that lording it over and bullying students is traditional and the way the old masters did it.

As I have said before, I actually think that traditional martial arts are bullet-proof. They continue to survive and even thrive regardless of the latest "best most devastating art" to come and then go.

That's kind of what I suspected. It's the same with traditional European MA's. Small classes, drill when it's time, ask questions when it's time. There are even some examples of question and answer periods that were either recorded, or imagined. Something like "students may ask "such and such" and the master would reply: "yada yada yada".

Now, there was mass training for the armies, and that may be reflected in what we see today in large training halls, but I don't think that's what most of us are trying to find for ourselves.

Now, since I study a relatively new, American MA, the one started by Chuck Norris, "traditional" is what we did at first - that is, what Mr. Norris decided we should do. It's relatively formal, but more than that, it is very respectful to everybody, and that gives it a traditional feel.

Some of the things we do, such as bowing to the flag, and bowing in and out, is (imho) a sign of respect to the Tang So Do that forms the basis for Mr. Norris teaching, as well as Mr. Wright, my school instructor.

 

[Steel Tiger]

Now, since I study a relatively new, American MA, the one started by Chuck Norris, "traditional" is what we did at first - that is, what Mr. Norris decided we should do. It's relatively formal, but more than that, it is very respectful to everybody, and that gives it a traditional feel.

Some of the things we do, such as bowing to the flag, and bowing in and out, is (imho) a sign of respect to the Tang So Do that forms the basis for Mr. Norris teaching, as well as Mr. Wright, my school instructor.

You are is a rare situation in the martial arts in that you are able to actually learn, first hand (maybe second), what the traditions are and how they look and are imparted.