Articles | YMAA

The Shaolin Temple and the Shaolin Diaspora
November 27, 2023
With the Abbot of Shaolin Temple visit to California in November 2023, Staff Writer Gene Ching ruminates over the distinctions between some Shaolin styles of Kung Fu practiced around the world and the curriculum propounded at the original Shaolin Temple of China today
Myths, Legends, Archetypes and Stereotypes in Martial Arts
November 13, 2023
While both myths and legends possess an undeniable appeal, transforming mundane truths into powerful stories, these tales also serve a martial function.
Preserving the Legacy of Two-Person Forms in the Chinese Martial Arts
July 31, 2023
In the wake of Michelle Lin & Quentin Lopes chat with Gene Ching about their new "Barehand vs Staff Sequence", Staff Writer Gene Ching explores the legacy of two-person training sequences in the Chinese martial arts.
Why my Lianbuquan is Different from Yours
July 25, 2022
There are countless kung fu forms across innumerable schools and lineages, but sometimes different schools share the same form. While reviewing the Shaolin Long Fist Kung Fu Complete Collection, YMAA Staff Writer Gene Ching discovered some overlapping forms between his Northern Shaolin tradition and YMAA’s curriculum and discusses the shared roots and divergences.
Needle Through Brick: A Postcard of Traditional Kung Fu from Borneo
February 11, 2021
Needle Through Brick is a documentary that poses these questions by taking an intimate look at some surviving traditional Kung Fu and Tai Chi masters of Malaysian Borneo, particularly Sarawak and Sibu. There’s a large Chinese population here, a diaspora of masters who fled the Japanese occupation and the communists. Needle Through Brick presents insightful interviews of Borneo’s unique elder masters as the precious disciplines that they have dedicated their lives to face extinction.
Protecting the Brain from Trauma: A Home Experiment to Show We Can Do Better - September 7, 2015
If you put on a football helmet right now and smacked yourself in the head with your hands, you might notice you can hit yourself pretty hard before you start to feel pain. You could even grab a stapler or a coffee mug and hit yourself with that. If you are like me, smacking yourself in the head is the first thing you do when you put a helmet on, just to test it out.
The Differences Between San Shou Shuai Jiao and Other Styles of Wrestling - July 5, 2010
Technically speaking, the foundation and basic principles of San Shou Shuai Jiao are based on traditional Chinese wrestling (Chuan Tong Shuai Jiao) and adapted for combat training. San Shou Shuai Jiao techniques and principles are very simple, effective and—most important—quick.