I have a theory that language effects how we process martial arts. The western language uses letters to form words whereas Asian they have logograms that infer concepts. The western way of thinking would be breaking things down piece by piece to form a combination. a jab, a cross, a hook etc this is like Western writing while Taoul or Kata to me feel like Iogograms.
Language definitely has an effect on how we process ALL information, not just martial arts information. There are concepts like "Beng Da" or downward striking, but that is a concept not a specific technique so a rolling, vertical backfist falls within the concept, and so does the hammer fist.
This is definitely needed these days. Chinese martial arts has a lot to offer those who are interested in combative theory and technique, but with the lack of a common understanding of martial arts vernacular, as well as a decline in actual fighting knowledge, Chinese martial arts are in danger of becoming little more than a performance art... that is, if it even survives at all. There's a reason why there have been past attempts to collect, organize, and unify a lot of Chinese martial arts concepts, and while they haven't been entirely successful, such an undertaking is still needed. I'm very interested in seeing how your endeavor will fare, and I applaud your take and approach of this art.
Great video, I was inspired to write a wuxia novel as you were going over the connections of styles in the caravan business and the prevalence of meihuaquan. My first teacher grew up in a Muslim community in Kaifeng learning the whole system of Cha quan including the poems that went with it, however sadly a lot of that has been lost as he later went to a sports college and focused on wushu and sanda. So his teacher has passed and he only remembers 3 of the 10 sets vaguely. It was interesting that he has stories of their sparring approach that I have not heard of in many places. Essentially they learned alot of forms but then the student and teacher would hone it down to 6 or so that would be that students main sparring arsenal so they would sort of choose from the library what suited this persons individual fighting style and adapt it with smaller more practical movements. I wish I could find anyone who is still passing this down to adopt to my own practice. So I am definitely on board and interested in your project
Great video. I believe some of the reasons for the similiarities are due to "experimenting" with defenses as well as learning from fights and battles as to what works and what does not.
haven't watched your stuff in a while, but i really appreciate how you present your thoughts and analysis through historical evidence and vestiges of modern practice, thank you for the video
I am very blessed to be a part of these ancient methods. We must submerge ourselves. Not only combative / mediation- Achieve higher levels - Shen - spirit - Intent
I used to do Hungga kuen and in it you see so much variety; Village styles, Wong Fei Hong styles, pre-Wong Fei Hung styles, non- Wong Fei Hong styles, Tiger and Crane etc. You are not wrong, the labels we use to classify "martial arts", can be confusing or misleading. If a style has kicking, boxing, wrestling, fencing etc, of course its a mixed martial art😂. Modern soldiers just as their ancient counterparts had to know a variety of skills just to survive on the battlefield. They pressure tested their skills because their lives depended upon what they could or could not do. Science in action, none of this armchair "wind"😂. I think. Thank you for a well thought out video.👍
Kudos for taking on such a demanding project. I've been trying to do something similar with medieval grappling from European historical manuals. Whereas your system has a long living tradition (in decline,as you say), mine disappeared from tradition centuries ago with only a few cultural remnants surviving, and those have lost most of their martial context. Interpreting written instructions has been quite a task, but very revealing as to the nature of universally common movement, mechanics, and application with other systems, goal, and resources not withstanding. I wish you well in your work, and will be watching with great intetest. Cheers!! 👍
@@krdietiker Thank you for the well wishes 👍 your field is definitely a challenging but rewarding one, I hope you uncover more and more as time goes on. The modern European wrestling sports should provide some insight, when filtered based on medieval context, no?
@the.wandering.warrior yes and no. I think the caveat on that is looking at the finer details. There is a bit of difference in parsing methods between self-defense, dueling, and sports (all having existed historically as they do today). Primarily in that intent and goal affect what one trains and how one trains it, what is acceptable levels of violence and what isn't allowed based on rule sets, and the disparity between survival and winning. Sure, there's cross over in those circles, an overlap within the venn diagram, but that just adds to the nuance in recreating the techniques in how they get inserted into their respective contexts. Tbf, even the historical records tend to vary on what context they are applying their technical data and tactical advice. I hope to someday be able to share some of my insights. TH-cam seems to be the current preferred method. I'm sure I'll make some enemies along the way. Lol
Awesome video as always. So glad to find your channel. Im from south america so I really hope I can acquire your courses some day. I know they will be fire, the love, knowledge and pragmatism you conduct yourself with when talking about TCMA is all the evidence I need.
I appreciate your work in researching this topic. I started with "long fist" in a somewhat typical modern environment, where fighting was taught separately in the form of kickboxing and forms were practiced purely for the reason of aesthetics and exercise. Eventually my frustration with the splitting of form/function led me to train in China with WuNanfang of the WuGulun Shaolin lineage. The narrative that formed from that experience was that "Kung Fu", at least in the Shaolin Temple related context, derives from the skill of setting up your attack with correct body placement and footwork. The traditional techniques can be thought of like a modern double leg takedown, where there's a defense, distraction, contact, all hiding a step and movement of the body that allows for a decisive technique. Its interesting to consider the way people talk about a skilled wrestlers double/single leg as a nearly unstoppable technique. Similarly, a picture immerges of Chinese martial arts as a collection of such "unstoppable techniques", if one develops all the necessary skills to achieve the "set up" that allows for that same sort of overwhelming effect that a double/single leg takedown has from a skilled wrestler. It can be understood then that the diversity of styles is possible based on the diversity of limb positioning, hand shapes, possible for the human body, but when one looks at the footwork and body positioning, the fundamental skill of setting up your techniques correctly, then the commonality becomes clearer
@@rojcewiczj right, the flavor of the fighting movement and the setting up tactically is often what makes the system more so than the techniques themselves although certain circumstances can result in certain more unique techniques... From my observation it looks like there is a general long fist flavor of setting things up and it results in a common language of fighting movement that long fist type styles tend to adopt... And I think we see that same kind of movement language development anywhere For me I think of it as a very useful way to conceptualize this stuff
I've had the luck to train under some very good instructors (by local standards), but my life as an academic has alway meant a lot of moving around. I've always been struck by the degree to which many of the fundamental technical concepts are similar across different styles, but hugely informed by conditioning precepts and preferred underlying mechanics. Where compatible, suddenly you get blends out of nowhere as players adapt things to what fits their bodies, or show their students things which don't fit them, but do fit a smaller or later or stiffer or bendier student better example: I have a student who's fast and lean and tough and strong... and about 140 soaking wet. He learned the hard way that some people can simply pick him up in two hands like a briefcase because size matters. So his approach to certain techniques HAS to cover him against those possibilities in ways the big guys don't need. And good instructors seem to be sensitive to that as they work to bring out the best in all their students.
@@russmitchellmovement I think I'd agree with that... I am personally engaged in Mongolian wrestling as of last year, which has no weight classes, a lot of my preferences in movement and mechanics has necessarily had to change and adapt as it is filtered through what works against somebody twice my size vs a way of doing things that worked well against somebody my own size. It's an amazing Crucible in which to really hone my skills but it also does bias me because I can only do what is most efficient for a smaller person to do against the larger... There are things or ways of doing things which I will be unlikely to explore.
We build a quan pu translator which works awesome. (Ancient technique list translator) Everyone who is interested in translating his quan pu can write us.
Randy brown a mantis practitioner has talked before In academic lectures about how this common vernacular came in to existence existence in both the Ching dynasty and before and goes into historical accounts of people like qi jiguang to illustrate how this was a thing I would recommend checking it out
@@the.wandering.warrior Absolutely, You him and a couple of others are? Probably the only ones who understand how it can be used practically and how it ties in to how it's been used historically from a very indepth and academic level that you don't really see as much with a lot of other people who study chinese boxing/quanshu
@@gnos1s171 thank you for the kind words, I've met others who can fight and have a TCMA background but we seem to be a dying breed so to speak. Those who can fight AND do scholarly research or study - even fewer... but there's people out there :)
Do animal styles of kungfu have a philosophy? Mine is tiger kungfu my sifu only focused on self defense so i never get chance to learn what is our philosophy
@@AllenGray-o2z every system or style does have some kind of underlying combat philosophy or strategic doctrine, but NOT every martial arts system or style is associated with some kind of broader philosophy on life
@the.wandering.warrior Raven: Length: 36" Weight: 9.5 ounces Shaft material: Solid fiberglass Handle Diameter: 2" Tip: Polyurethane From black swift cane company. I want to learn how to use it for self defense. The goal is to keep distance between me and attacker. Also to fend off "oh he wont bite" unleased dogs
Is long fist actually practical in a street fight? It looks very impractical with its very long range swings and the moves looks very telegraph. Also, you see it use in performance wushu competition.
I'm glad you mentioned that! I think although the modern practice of Taiji has deviated a lot, at its core it seems to me to be a wrestling-heavy dialect of the long fist language
@@the.wandering.warrior yes, a lot of tai chi practitioners like to present themselves as being different, internal and therefore different from the external traditions like long fist and other shaolin styles. In reality it doesn’t take much to see that much of the postures and stances come from this shared tradition; you can even check them against the techniques compiled by Qi Jiguang in his Jixiao Xinshu (Chapter 14).
My Praying Mantis instructor also did and taught Taiji and, as he explained it, one informed the other and insisted we learn both (though I always had a preference for PM).
@@Zz7722zZ 100% agree and I think that what we think of as Taiji today was once really just an even more wrestling focused end of the Long Fist 'language' - and at one point stone lifting, heavy sandbag throwing, and wrestling skills were far more emphasized... Now did they figure out some awesome internal mechanics? Sure... But I'd argue if you don't do all that made taiji (ie the long-fist type fighting and wrestling and weight lifting) and ONLY do the forms and 'internal' practice, you're not learning to fight... And I think that's what went 'wrong'
I trained Mantis Boxing with Shifu Randy Brown in Massachusetts, USA - what he learned was a blend of Seven Star Mantis and Eight step Mantis. Many of our fight drills were from 8 step but many techniques and the forms seemed to be mostly 7 star. I come from a mixed martial background in that way.
Very informative video I am a Mantis practitioner myself. I am not as well versed as my teacher prefers that I become proficient in certain forms and techniques rather then feeding me the entire curiculm all at once but my hunger for martial arts learning I find myself looking at other sources and coming up with my own ways of training which in turn I have been trying to create my own venacular and system based on the common language of martial art breaking them down and categorzing the smallest of moves, a punch, an elbow, a kick etc. Then formulating what I can out of them based on logic. I am however at a loss at the internal aspects of striking like from Xing Yi being more used to the western application of power generation.
Strange question. Because every system by its nature has wrestling and all in it. Each leaning toward the needs of that area. When they moved around they mixed and exchanged enriching themselves.
as far as I know Chang quan and Shuai Jiao were not one style. Chang quan (as in long fist) is a method incorporating a certain fighting frame and punching method with a plethora of wrestling techniques - but it isn't in and of itself wrestling. It certainly isn't the Qing dynasty shuai jiao coming from the Manchu. Now in the Republican era forms of Long fist were taught to ROC soldiers and many of them also learned a military form of Shuai Jiao (from the Qing era) so in the early 1900s some of them might have mixed their skills. Some of the Baoding shuai jiao guys also mixed shaolin into their training, some other shuai jiao guys did Da liu he, and some Manchu took on Taiji, forming ONE of the Wu style taiji groups.
quan is my way of fighting, thank you for your help, I'm luring more about Chinese quan boxing.
I have a theory that language effects how we process martial arts. The western language uses letters to form words whereas Asian they have logograms that infer concepts. The western way of thinking would be breaking things down piece by piece to form a combination. a jab, a cross, a hook etc this is like Western writing while Taoul or Kata to me feel like Iogograms.
@@LunaticReason I think there is some truth to that 👍
Language definitely has an effect on how we process ALL information, not just martial arts information. There are concepts like "Beng Da" or downward striking, but that is a concept not a specific technique so a rolling, vertical backfist falls within the concept, and so does the hammer fist.
This is definitely needed these days. Chinese martial arts has a lot to offer those who are interested in combative theory and technique, but with the lack of a common understanding of martial arts vernacular, as well as a decline in actual fighting knowledge, Chinese martial arts are in danger of becoming little more than a performance art... that is, if it even survives at all. There's a reason why there have been past attempts to collect, organize, and unify a lot of Chinese martial arts concepts, and while they haven't been entirely successful, such an undertaking is still needed. I'm very interested in seeing how your endeavor will fare, and I applaud your take and approach of this art.
@@Swordsage I appreciate you commenting and sharing your thoughts on the matter, I agree and I hope I can make a difference 💪
Great video, I was inspired to write a wuxia novel as you were going over the connections of styles in the caravan business and the prevalence of meihuaquan. My first teacher grew up in a Muslim community in Kaifeng learning the whole system of Cha quan including the poems that went with it, however sadly a lot of that has been lost as he later went to a sports college and focused on wushu and sanda. So his teacher has passed and he only remembers 3 of the 10 sets vaguely. It was interesting that he has stories of their sparring approach that I have not heard of in many places. Essentially they learned alot of forms but then the student and teacher would hone it down to 6 or so that would be that students main sparring arsenal so they would sort of choose from the library what suited this persons individual fighting style and adapt it with smaller more practical movements. I wish I could find anyone who is still passing this down to adopt to my own practice. So I am definitely on board and interested in your project
Me too!
Great video. I believe some of the reasons for the similiarities are due to "experimenting" with defenses as well as learning from fights and battles as to what works and what does not.
haven't watched your stuff in a while, but i really appreciate how you present your thoughts and analysis through historical evidence and vestiges of modern practice, thank you for the video
I am very blessed to be a part of these ancient methods. We must submerge ourselves. Not only combative / mediation- Achieve higher levels - Shen - spirit - Intent
I used to do Hungga kuen and in it you see so much variety; Village styles, Wong Fei Hong styles, pre-Wong Fei Hung styles, non- Wong Fei Hong styles, Tiger and Crane etc. You are not wrong, the labels we use to classify "martial arts", can be confusing or misleading. If a style has kicking, boxing, wrestling, fencing etc, of course its a mixed martial art😂. Modern soldiers just as their ancient counterparts had to know a variety of skills just to survive on the battlefield. They pressure tested their skills because their lives depended upon what they could or could not do. Science in action, none of this armchair "wind"😂. I think. Thank you for a well thought out video.👍
Kudos for taking on such a demanding project. I've been trying to do something similar with medieval grappling from European historical manuals. Whereas your system has a long living tradition (in decline,as you say), mine disappeared from tradition centuries ago with only a few cultural remnants surviving, and those have lost most of their martial context. Interpreting written instructions has been quite a task, but very revealing as to the nature of universally common movement, mechanics, and application with other systems, goal, and resources not withstanding. I wish you well in your work, and will be watching with great intetest. Cheers!! 👍
@@krdietiker Thank you for the well wishes 👍 your field is definitely a challenging but rewarding one, I hope you uncover more and more as time goes on. The modern European wrestling sports should provide some insight, when filtered based on medieval context, no?
@the.wandering.warrior yes and no. I think the caveat on that is looking at the finer details. There is a bit of difference in parsing methods between self-defense, dueling, and sports (all having existed historically as they do today). Primarily in that intent and goal affect what one trains and how one trains it, what is acceptable levels of violence and what isn't allowed based on rule sets, and the disparity between survival and winning. Sure, there's cross over in those circles, an overlap within the venn diagram, but that just adds to the nuance in recreating the techniques in how they get inserted into their respective contexts. Tbf, even the historical records tend to vary on what context they are applying their technical data and tactical advice. I hope to someday be able to share some of my insights. TH-cam seems to be the current preferred method. I'm sure I'll make some enemies along the way. Lol
Awesome video as always. So glad to find your channel. Im from south america so I really hope I can acquire your courses some day.
I know they will be fire, the love, knowledge and pragmatism you conduct yourself with when talking about TCMA is all the evidence I need.
@@kevinlobos5519 🙏 thank you
Great video. Thank you sir. Excellent information.
@@the36thchamber89 🙏
Dig your approach
I appreciate your work in researching this topic. I started with "long fist" in a somewhat typical modern environment, where fighting was taught separately in the form of kickboxing and forms were practiced purely for the reason of aesthetics and exercise. Eventually my frustration with the splitting of form/function led me to train in China with WuNanfang of the WuGulun Shaolin lineage. The narrative that formed from that experience was that "Kung Fu", at least in the Shaolin Temple related context, derives from the skill of setting up your attack with correct body placement and footwork. The traditional techniques can be thought of like a modern double leg takedown, where there's a defense, distraction, contact, all hiding a step and movement of the body that allows for a decisive technique. Its interesting to consider the way people talk about a skilled wrestlers double/single leg as a nearly unstoppable technique. Similarly, a picture immerges of Chinese martial arts as a collection of such "unstoppable techniques", if one develops all the necessary skills to achieve the "set up" that allows for that same sort of overwhelming effect that a double/single leg takedown has from a skilled wrestler. It can be understood then that the diversity of styles is possible based on the diversity of limb positioning, hand shapes, possible for the human body, but when one looks at the footwork and body positioning, the fundamental skill of setting up your techniques correctly, then the commonality becomes clearer
@@rojcewiczj right, the flavor of the fighting movement and the setting up tactically is often what makes the system more so than the techniques themselves although certain circumstances can result in certain more unique techniques...
From my observation it looks like there is a general long fist flavor of setting things up and it results in a common language of fighting movement that long fist type styles tend to adopt... And I think we see that same kind of movement language development anywhere
For me I think of it as a very useful way to conceptualize this stuff
I would love to see a video where you spar Mantis and how you train for that.
@@Buffalodan66 I'll keep that in mind and plan for that content 👍
I've had the luck to train under some very good instructors (by local standards), but my life as an academic has alway meant a lot of moving around. I've always been struck by the degree to which many of the fundamental technical concepts are similar across different styles, but hugely informed by conditioning precepts and preferred underlying mechanics. Where compatible, suddenly you get blends out of nowhere as players adapt things to what fits their bodies, or show their students things which don't fit them, but do fit a smaller or later or stiffer or bendier student better example: I have a student who's fast and lean and tough and strong... and about 140 soaking wet. He learned the hard way that some people can simply pick him up in two hands like a briefcase because size matters. So his approach to certain techniques HAS to cover him against those possibilities in ways the big guys don't need. And good instructors seem to be sensitive to that as they work to bring out the best in all their students.
@@russmitchellmovement I think I'd agree with that... I am personally engaged in Mongolian wrestling as of last year, which has no weight classes, a lot of my preferences in movement and mechanics has necessarily had to change and adapt as it is filtered through what works against somebody twice my size vs a way of doing things that worked well against somebody my own size. It's an amazing Crucible in which to really hone my skills but it also does bias me because I can only do what is most efficient for a smaller person to do against the larger... There are things or ways of doing things which I will be unlikely to explore.
Love your videos! Do you have any book recommendations?
Edit: Or movies, documentaries, blogs, whatever!
Great content 👌
thank you, please share it with your friends
We build a quan pu translator which works awesome. (Ancient technique list translator) Everyone who is interested in translating his quan pu can write us.
Why are there so many secrecy around mizhong quan?
Randy brown a mantis practitioner has talked before In academic lectures about how this common vernacular came in to existence existence in both the Ching dynasty and before and goes into historical accounts of people like qi jiguang to illustrate how this was a thing I would recommend checking it out
@@gnos1s171 yeah he's my teacher ❤️
@@the.wandering.warrior ohhhhhhhh... That explains how you know so much about this lol😅
@@gnos1s171 yup, I appreciate his work quite a lot. I think he's doing great things for the understanding of TCMA and for his students' training.
@@the.wandering.warrior Absolutely, You him and a couple of others are?
Probably the only ones who understand how it can be used practically and how it ties in to how it's been used historically from a very indepth and academic level that you don't really see as much with a lot of other people who study chinese boxing/quanshu
@@gnos1s171 thank you for the kind words, I've met others who can fight and have a TCMA background but we seem to be a dying breed so to speak. Those who can fight AND do scholarly research or study - even fewer... but there's people out there :)
Do animal styles of kungfu have a philosophy?
Mine is tiger kungfu my sifu only focused on self defense so i never get chance to learn what is our philosophy
@@AllenGray-o2z every system or style does have some kind of underlying combat philosophy or strategic doctrine, but NOT every martial arts system or style is associated with some kind of broader philosophy on life
How much to hire you to teach stick fighting?
@@MissionSilo at the moment I don't teach stick fighting, but I will in the future
@@the.wandering.warrior I have a black swift fiber glass cane. I need help learning how to use it
@@MissionSilo what are the dimensions of the cane, and what is the context that you want to train up to?
@the.wandering.warrior
Raven:
Length: 36"
Weight: 9.5 ounces
Shaft material: Solid fiberglass
Handle Diameter: 2"
Tip: Polyurethane
From black swift cane company.
I want to learn how to use it for self defense. The goal is to keep distance between me and attacker. Also to fend off "oh he wont bite" unleased dogs
@@MissionSilo ok, one more thing, if you don't mind, where is the point of balance? How many inches/cm from the head is the balance point?
Is long fist actually practical in a street fight? It looks very impractical with its very long range swings and the moves looks very telegraph. Also, you see it use in performance wushu competition.
Yes. Taichi also speaks this language!!
I'm glad you mentioned that! I think although the modern practice of Taiji has deviated a lot, at its core it seems to me to be a wrestling-heavy dialect of the long fist language
@@the.wandering.warrior yes, a lot of tai chi practitioners like to present themselves as being different, internal and therefore different from the external traditions like long fist and other shaolin styles. In reality it doesn’t take much to see that much of the postures and stances come from this shared tradition; you can even check them against the techniques compiled by Qi Jiguang in his Jixiao Xinshu (Chapter 14).
My Praying Mantis instructor also did and taught Taiji and, as he explained it, one informed the other and insisted we learn both (though I always had a preference for PM).
@@Zz7722zZ 100% agree and I think that what we think of as Taiji today was once really just an even more wrestling focused end of the Long Fist 'language' - and at one point stone lifting, heavy sandbag throwing, and wrestling skills were far more emphasized... Now did they figure out some awesome internal mechanics? Sure... But I'd argue if you don't do all that made taiji (ie the long-fist type fighting and wrestling and weight lifting) and ONLY do the forms and 'internal' practice, you're not learning to fight... And I think that's what went 'wrong'
@@krdietiker my Mantis shifu also emphasized the deep similarities between taiji and tanglangquan 👍👍
I know the questions get annoying, but which Mantis tradition is yours?
I trained Mantis Boxing with Shifu Randy Brown in Massachusetts, USA - what he learned was a blend of Seven Star Mantis and Eight step Mantis. Many of our fight drills were from 8 step but many techniques and the forms seemed to be mostly 7 star. I come from a mixed martial background in that way.
Very informative video I am a Mantis practitioner myself. I am not as well versed as my teacher prefers that I become proficient in certain forms and techniques rather then feeding me the entire curiculm all at once but my hunger for martial arts learning I find myself looking at other sources and coming up with my own ways of training which in turn I have been trying to create my own venacular and system based on the common language of martial art breaking them down and categorzing the smallest of moves, a punch, an elbow, a kick etc. Then formulating what I can out of them based on logic. I am however at a loss at the internal aspects of striking like from Xing Yi being more used to the western application of power generation.
Good luck on your efforts... you may find the online course content I'm creating very helpful, given the mission you're undertaking. Stay tuned!
👊😵💫🗯️I have no clue about
🥋 Martial Arts…
But I listen carefully⁉️
Here's a question: I know Chang Chuan and Shuai Jow were once one style. Which version of Chang Chuan was it?
Strange question. Because every system by its nature has wrestling and all in it. Each leaning toward the needs of that area. When they moved around they mixed and exchanged enriching themselves.
as far as I know Chang quan and Shuai Jiao were not one style. Chang quan (as in long fist) is a method incorporating a certain fighting frame and punching method with a plethora of wrestling techniques - but it isn't in and of itself wrestling. It certainly isn't the Qing dynasty shuai jiao coming from the Manchu. Now in the Republican era forms of Long fist were taught to ROC soldiers and many of them also learned a military form of Shuai Jiao (from the Qing era) so in the early 1900s some of them might have mixed their skills. Some of the Baoding shuai jiao guys also mixed shaolin into their training, some other shuai jiao guys did Da liu he, and some Manchu took on Taiji, forming ONE of the Wu style taiji groups.
For some or other reason I keep hearing qún or chún, rather than quán. 可能我的耳朵有毛病。。。😕👂
@@UCGz8hv81ZQM6y4sSEWkQtAw 🤷🏻♂️
He's Taiwanese, my step dad used to say "zen" for 人。
No vernacular means a derby it’s a hat 🎩 Have you ever watched stooges 🤦🏼♂️