Once apon a time... the name of Kung Fu

[ahgao]

I have read alot of poster who uses the name Kungfu for Chinese Martial Arts, and I would like to share...

 

In Asia country, we name CMA as Wushu not kungfu, simply becos kungfu can be anything, cooking kungfu, building kungfu, swimming kungfu. In a nutshell, kungfu in our (asia) hearts mean "ability to be good in".

 

Wushu can be term as Internal or External art of CMA, before the Chinese Revolution, wushu is call Guo Shu > Country Art (China).

 

But when CMA is brought into western country, it became:

 

1)wushu - flowerly pattern of CMA, not use for combat

 

2)kungfu - traditional CMA which can be for combat

 

Did I miss anything out

[cross]

thats explains it well. im sure it will help alot of people.. nice work

[ninjanurse]

Thanks for the info. I was confused as I recently started at a school which teaches "kung fu" along with TKD but the Master refers to it as wushu in conversation. Now I know why.

 

[ahgao]

My pleasure to help people to understand...

 

Some also uses the term "Moe Kung" - Wu Gong / Martial Skill, to signify combat art of wushu...

[Sepultura]

Thx for the good info!

[Drunken Monkey]

well, there's also the point that when we talk of martial art, we also further qualify by stating what art

 

i.e: quan shu=fist art

 

and when we talk about learning kung fu we normally refer to it by name

 

i.e: i pratise hung gar quan

 

which if you go a bit further should be

 

hung gar quan shu

 

or

 

hung family art of fist

 

(or fighting if you prefere, translating isn't that straight forward i'm afraid but you get the idea)

[ahgao]

No offence meant f.t.g.u., I just wanna show a very standard approach towards Kungfu

.... and when we talk about learning kung fu we normally refer to it by name

 

i.e: i pratise hung gar quan

This is a common e.g. of relating a CMA as Kung Fu

 

f.t.g.u. has express the art of Hung Gar as Kung Fu and yet all this is still under the umbrealla of Wushu, yar

[Drunken Monkey]

well, kind of.

 

wushu does translate as martial art.

 

however, the chinese government seems to have taken the term wushu as their own to describe the flowery patterns that they have a strict syllabus for.

 

it is all kinda messy but yes, wushu=martial arts.

 

but then, like the guy said, kung fu isn't just martial arts, it is about skill in an art, any art.