Scott P. Phillips wrote:As for my African Bagua Videos 1 & 2. I have changed my opinion some in the last year, as you can see if you read posts in the Baguazhang or History categories. But the basic premise still stands. Africa and China have much in common religiously, and there is a meaningful parallel between African martial dances and Chinese martial arts.
Chinese martial arts is a theatrical performing religious tradition, interwoven with ritual healing, exorcism, and trance-possession which can actually be used for fighting. A religious-dance culture can be found in Africa which has these same attributes.
Prior to the 20th Century there may have been some part of China, or some Chinese military force somewhere, in which pure martial arts were practiced. It's possible. Nearly all Chinese scholarship in the 20th Century has pursued this line of reasoning. China had the highest literacy rate of any country in the world for 2000 years, yet almost nothing written about pure martial arts. They have mined the storehouses of knowledge digging everywhere for scrolls and of the few they have found, even some of those are fakes.
It's time to give up on that idea. Martial arts, Opera, Religion, and healing arts have all suffered great losses because of it. The truth may hurt, but the richness of Daoist, martial, ritual theater is worth trying to recover. And you guys have a role to play in that.
Blind Sage said, "Read [Scott's] bio, he's about performance.... well that and apparently showing the rest of us how we don't really understand IMA, while smiling and wishing us a happy day." Thank you for reading my bio, it was the most respectful thing you could have done-- I feel so....understood.
blindsage wrote:What truth? This is all conjecture based on observation and connections you claim, but aren't backed with anything. You're calling other people to set aside delusions? Religious dance culture's exist EVERYWHERE: various parts of Africa, Europe, North and South America, China, Japan, South East Asia, the Middle East, the Indian subcontinent, Australia, the Pacific, how is this a revelatory concept? Do you have any actual evidence of direct connection between African (and which African btw) traditions and Chinese, aside from your own conjecture? And how is it that you've just stumbled on this contrarian notion and every other person who's studied Chinese MA hasn't?Blind Sage said, "Read [Scott's] bio, he's about performance.... well that and apparently showing the rest of us how we don't really understand IMA, while smiling and wishing us a happy day." Thank you for reading my bio, it was the most respectful thing you could have done-- I feel so....understood.
I'm glad you feel understood. But aside from the sarcasm, you put out videos with all kinds of passive aggressive, and not so passive criticisms of most of the rest of the IMA community and then put on a smiley face at the end of everything. Expect criticism back.
I have now finished the whiskey.
Return to Xingyiquan - Baguazhang - Taijiquan
Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 25 guests