What constitutes a Martial Art? What constitutes Martial Sport/skills? Are they different?

Wai Jia: The Kung Fu Forum Kung Fu Forum
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In your view, what is a Martial Art? What are Martial Sports/skills? Are they seperate entities? Or merely avatars of the same being?

Many have pointed out that a martial art has a component of spiritual development, whereas martial sports do not.

Some have argued that the lack of a spiritual component, the lack of a character building curriculum, dooms arts practiced as sports to never growing beyond a rough and ready athletic competition.

I disagree to the utmost, and here’s why:

In any art, regardless of creed, I can find jerks. They bow to sah buh nim, shifu, or sensei, pay homage to their coach, and respect the senior belts/ranks who are higher than them or those that can kick their butts.

Give them somebody that they can take or is equal in ability, and they will turn into buttheads. God forbid you catch them or guard or beat them… then they come after you with a vengence. They simply want to hurt you. So much for character building.

You also have people who greatly respect the spiritual code of their art and are quite fine individuals.

Guess what? In sport, its the SAME THING. Except we call it “sportsmanship.” Sportsmanship is character building by another name. You conduct yourself with respect and dignity. You give everything you’ve got in competition. You offer your opponent a hand off the mat if you win. If you win, you win in celebration, perhaps of your victory, but never by taunting your opponents loss.

You begin the match with a handshake. You don’t scream and shout and whine about losing, even if it was a bad call. You pick yourself up, shake it off, and offer your opponent verbal or non-verbal congratulations.

Good Sportsmanship and Good character building are the same thing.

Bad sportsmanship and bad character are the same as well.

So what’s the difference between a martial art and a sport? You can’t tell me that “some techniqes are allowed in sport, but arts have all.” That’s just not true! That’s just the difference between the ring and the street, not sport and art.

Let the flames begin!!! :slight_smile:

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no flames here. i agree wholeheartedly.

my feeling has long been that individuals dictate morality and spirituality. not arts.

plenty of teachers don’t broach the subject. and worse, plenty of teachers use spirituality as a selling point. but nothing more.

sports are often touted as being character building. and i believe they certainly can be. for many of the same reasons that a traditional martial arts curriculum can be. set goals. meet with adversity. overcome adversity. build character.

in a lot of ways, i think the sportive elements of martial arts can provide more character development. there’s a built in reality check. without testing ourselves, we can get complacent. we begin to believe our own press. sports offer one arena for getting back to reality and showing us where we stand.

the sportsmanship i saw in stickfighting was a good example. and the sportsmanship was evident.

you could point at something like professional boxing as a counter to that, but then that introduces another element again: business.

stuart b.

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perhaps a good place to start would be a definition of ‘spirituality’?

assuming we all have access to a dictionary, maybe we can skip the cutting and pasting and get down to what we think.

what do you think?

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Art versus Sport

I think that it is the motives and aspirations of the individual practitioner that make the difference.

For example:

Two guys start training at the same time, at the same school, under the same instructor. One guy developes as a great fighter while the other guy excels in forms, weapons, history, philosophy, and teaching.

One guy is a martialist (to use Musashi’s terminology) and the other guy is a martial artist.

Just my opinion. :slight_smile:

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I think what sets a martial arts system that is complete and a martial sport is it’s street worthiness. Sports train you to not hit as hard as you would have to in order to defend yourself. In sport, you’re only to hit as hard as you can to “score” a point. But, this is only in SOME sport martial arts, and only in SOME competitions. Take boxing–they don’t hold back at all, and that’s a sport and they can certainly defend themselves.

Also, in sport you’re not allowed to hit certain areas as you would train to hit in self-defense (the neck/throat for example). The sport is no fun if someone dies. But, in self-defense, that end might be necessary.

Also, sport is sort of choreographed in that you know where your opponent is allowed to hit, so you keep your guard up for those areas, but leave it down in other areas. This is bad practice for self-defense where you really don’t know what’s going to happen.

As far as character building, sportsmanship, spirituality, etc. All of that is a bi-product of martial arts and martial sport. That’s not something you can make someone do–unless you run a cult. It’s all something that the individual allows him/herself to do/believe, etc., through his/her practice.

Robin

Surrender yourself to nature and be all that you are.

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Ap Oweyn, I agree that a common definition of spirituality would help. However, you could argue that the “puritan work ethic,” is the spiritual part of martial sports in the US. I guess I was thinking specifically of “character building,” vice “spirituality,” because it is true that wrestling and boxing aren’t spiritual in the way that aikido is, for instance. However, PLENTY of Asian arts do not have a “spiritual aspect,” Therefore, I thought character growth would be a better term, because almost all Asian Arts have something like that in them.

Daedalus, neat answer. I assume the two are not mutually exclusive? One can be both a martialist and a martial artist?

How do you feel about art vs sport? Does that sentece even MEAN anything?

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Robin,

I disagree completely.

What you have described is the difference between a competition and the street, not the difference between a martial art and a martial sport.

Judo is a martial art. A shiai is a competition.

TKD is a martial art. A TKD tournament is a competition.

BJJ is a martial art. A submission grappling tournament is a competition.

The competition has the rules, not the art.

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Merryprankster,

Yeah, I think that’s the distinction I was groping for. Boxing, for example, may not be a spiritual pursuit in that nobody is saying to Lennox Lewis, “free your mind from attachments” and what not.

So yeah, better to stick to character development.

Stuart B.

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Sports “don’t build character, they reveal it.”

Same thing is true of martial arts, they serve as a great microcosm of life and can show your flaws and strengths in great detail. If you choose to use that opportunity to improve your character, then MA or sports can be great tools but simply as a mirror for those who will look into it.

OK, who said that? Certainly couldn’t have been me. The smell of bile rising in my own throat would have gagged me and I wouldn’t have gotten all that sap out.

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I think it is the idea of winning and losing that defines sport.

Remove that idea, but keep the determination, skill, even rules, and you have art.

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Robin,

I can see the distinction you’re making about rules and restrictions on targets and techniques. But it occurs to me that the leap in logic that it takes to make a sport street worthy is no greater than that it takes to make a martial art streetworthy.

Boxers don’t train to punch someone in the throat. But they have trained to land punches on moving, countering, and well conditioned opponents. So the leap necessary to then land a jab in the throat rather than on the nose isn’t that big, I shouldn’t think.

In contrast, martial artists are trained with a wider variety of techniques and targets. But without that same sort of intensity in training, when it comes right down to it, the leap is just as great. ‘Yes, I’ve trained to chop people in the throat, but this guy keeps weaving.’

I don’t know. Personally, I’m not a competitor, but I like to use a lot of their training methods. They work.

I imagine that you get a fair amount of both approaches in taekwondo, yeah?

Stuart B.

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myosimka,

not only are you a conn… a conneu…

not only do you watch a lot of movies, you’re a thinker too.

bravo.

[grin]

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I think Lyle nailed it. But if you hold that martial sports serve a purpose beyond competition, beyond winning and losing (i.e., preparation for reality, character building, etc.), then the discrepancy between art and sport, to my mind, is very small indeed.

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Lyle, I think, nailed it!

Moderators, close this thread. It’s pointless now :slight_smile:

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Thanks dude

Just don’t tell anyone.

Back on the original question.

Focus in training. I think you can approach TKD from an art point of view and aikido from a sport point of view.

Sports are competitive and hence imply the notion of COMPETITION.

I practice a style of karate as well as doing the eclectic JKD/BJJ/kali thing. I use some sport training techniques as I like the feeling of being in shape but I do not think about competition as a goal when I train. The only person I am trying to beat is myself. Even many competitors have this mind set but the essence of sport is competition with others and I think that’s the real different between a sport and an art. Is your opponent the other guy or yourself?

In contrast to what earlier posters put forth, I think the notion of street vs. ring is an entirely different distinction.

But then I could be wrong.

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your secret is safe with me, myosimka.