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Dear Folks:

I'm doing work on Korean Staff work and could use some well-recommended resources on SHAOLIN or Northern Chinese Staff traditions. I have a copy of the 4 volume "Shaolin Encyclopedia"...

What I find is that TAM TUI has pretty much been adopted by many Chinese MA as part of their trainiing regime. And like PAL DAN KUM ("Eight Pieces of Brocade") everybody seems to have their own...

I should also add that wrist and clothing grabs got a real boost with the advent of Judo under Kano. The sport put quite a number of practitioners on the Japanese streets who wanted to see if the...

Actually it happens a lot more times that we realize. The usual context is when a verbal altercation arises and a person attempts to disengage by moving away. The most common response is for a person...

I thought I would submit this, just for fun.

The material from the KWON BUP chapter of the MYTBTJ is said to be that of General Qi's Boxing Canon. However, the Koreans did not keep the same...

Since I study and teach Hapkido I can only comment on Aikido as a kind of "distant cousin". What I have seen is that even the people who train in Aikido don't have a clear appreciation of what they...

Sorry, Sal; you are right, of course. There is no reason to discuss something that gets talked to death on a regular basis. This thread is about HONG QUAN.

One small piece of research ought to be...

".................Over all, Kung Fu IS in a decline today, because of the over use of forms, and lack of actual learning of techniques and thier usage in a two man environment. There are a VAST...

And I agree with what you are saying. My question was going back a bit BEFORE that stage of application, though.

This is a bit of an OVER-simplification of my point but let me try this.
...

I'm sure that this issue has been covered before, and I apologize if I am sounding a bit dense, but, honestly, it sounds a bit oxy-moronic to use the sort of position I am hearing on this thread. ...

Thanks, Sal:

Good thoughts to be sure.

Have any authorities surveyed the manuals that you are citing so as to validate their age?

I know that here in the West, if someone were to come up...

Maybe, its better if we just tie this off. I want to hear what you are saying with a "positive internal voice" but I still hear anger and unless I miss my guess this exchange is not going to turn-out...

Well, then, I'm a bit confused. Putting the gun to one side what is it we are about in training? For instance, how many times have people been in class and a teacher states that such-and-such a move...

Could be. I would also throw-out another possibility.

Perhaps the individual techniques were found to be relatively easy to remember. However, as systems became larger and more sophisiticated it...

Not sure where all the anger is coming from. As far as I can tell we are having an decent discussion. A mildly self-deprecating comment is considered appropriate in those cases where written...

I might be wrong but it sounds like there is much more testosterone involved here than first indicated. Just because a person chooses not to seek-out combative situations does not automatically mean...

I am probably going to get shouted-down for this, but what I have found is that the sophisticated training material seems to represent an embellished system that over-trains a person to perform the...

This may not make any sense to most folks but the difference is actually quite simple.

Aikido, somewhat like Korean YU SOOL is based on Newtonian Physics, including manipulation of velocity,...

Most people I know choose to frequent places where the potential of this happening is practically non-existent. If you grew-up in the location, certainly you must have some idea of where violence is...

I find myself agreeing with practically everything thats being shared. There is one small piece that still brings me up short. That piece has to do with the idea of forms-work as it relates to...

Ah.. I don't mean to discount a good discussion. I only want to point out that the clip is a good example of what happens when someone takes material from another art and represents it as something...

I think TMA people forget that there are a full range of practices including martial theatre, martial commerce, and martial arts that are all competing for regard on the public stage. Add to this...

Can someone speak to the significance of identifying a tradition as "Seven Star"? Is this an alternate way of saying "northern"? Thoughts?

Best Wishes,

Bruce

I think you are very right, David.

I also think that using a term for which there is no actual understanding is equally fruitless. There are some terms such as "master" and "grandmaster" which...

Stanley Henning made quite a wave when he related that the greater amount of focus on "Shaolin" related more to literary works of the 18th and 19th Century than actual practices or concrete...