“…can never know anything about Chinese martial arts.”
This was actually said to a friend of mine by a Taiwan publisher. When I heard that he had said that, I was furious. After all, I and a lot of other foreigners give that guy a lot of business and some of us have been here for years or even decades training these arts. But the more I thought about it, the more that I was glad that he had come right out and said something that I think a lot of Taiwanese and Chinese are thinking.
Most of the time, this attitude is a lot more subtle. You’ll get the “let me tell the foreigner how it is” lecture. This is where the classmate feels it necessary to start from the beginning with Zhang San-feng and recount the entire history of taiji because no foreigner would supposedly know that. Apparently, we have no books in English on taiji.
Sometimes it’s the whole “foreigners don’t understand Chinese culture” bit. This one happens a lot. Usually this comes across as “I’m Chinese and you’re not, so let me tell you how it is.” What never seems to occur to the Chinese person in question is that a) the foreigner DOES understand but b) thinks the situation to be incredibly stupid and unnecessary. Most of the time, the foreigner is right about this (naturally I would think so, wouldn’t I? 
) and the situation could be avoided if people would just drop ridiculous concerns about face. But the zero-sum game mentality seems so firmly embedded in Chinese culture that any comment that another option exists is just discarded automatically.
But the worst cases of racism in CMA happen when people just naturally assume that NO foreigner at all could ever be good at CMA because…..well….they aren’t Chinese. This happens a lot. Take my recent episode with the xingyi teacher. This guy went out of his way to say that I had no neijin (internal power). Even after I got done throwing him and his student around, I was not out of breath but they were. Ironically, he said that my physical power was greater than theirs so I guess they were supposedly still using neijin. If I was just using muscle, why wasn’t I out of breath? Give me a break. The bottom line is that there was just no way they were going to acknowledge that I had any skill whatsoever. You’ll see this a lot: if any foreigner does anything martially it must be only because we are supposedly physically stronger. This is the default fallback position that allows *some* Chinese to save face and put the foreigner down.
I’ve talked to all my foreign friends that train CMA here and they’ve all experienced this. There was the taiji teacher that invited my friend to “try him out.” My friend threw him down multiple times and this teacher had the gall to lecture him on what he was supposedly doing wrong even while the teacher was picking himself up from the ground! This is a little of that “you can kick my ass but it’s still not taiji” thrown in for good measure. I can tell you my friend has studied for many, many years.
Oftentimes, foreigners in class are treated like they will just never understand or they are treated like second-class students. As has been mentioned on the board once already, Taiwanese (the language) is sometimes spoken to keep the foreigner out of the discussion and away from certain information. We aren’t stupid. When teachers and students all of a sudden switch to Taiwanese, it’s ALWAYS for a reason. With the resurgence of “Taiwan identity” this discrimination is now getting worse. People think they can hide rude behavior behind Taiwan nationalism and act like an ignorant hick.
The bottom line is that Chinese language and culture do play a part in understanding IMA. But this assumption that only great understanding of culture is needed outside of any physical practice really gets my goat. I’ve had people that have NEVER practiced any CMA at all here try to tell me that I didn’t understand CMA and they did. Can you believe it? These people seem to think that knowledge of this stuff is either genetic or can be totally derived from reading comic books. The publisher above fits this category since he doesn’t even train.
You won’t find this in all classes, but it’s more common in classes that have few or no foreigners, or with teachers that don’t have experience overseas. So the trick is to recognize it when it happens and then make the decision to stay or go. In some situations, you may be able to pick some things up, while in others it may be pointless. Not every teacher here is like this but it’s a rare situation where you won’t encounter some of it to a degree.
34 responses so far ↓
1 Thomas // May 24, 2007 at 11:15 am
Well, Dave, let me equalize things here and be the first foreigner to tell you that you obviously don’t understand a thing about Chinese martial arts and you lack neijin and just generally suck. And martial skill can be gained from reading comic books.
There, satisfied? ;- )
Seriously, I admire your dedication to CMA training and learning the language and culture, while not forgetting your own. Xu ling ding jin and spit in the eye of unfounded ethnocentric prejudices.
2 chessman71 // May 24, 2007 at 12:35 pm
Ha! I was watching Hong Kong Phooey from the time I could stand up and turn on the TV. Who’s the master, now?
Not forgetting your own culture here is important. Some foreigners respond to the things above by trying to become more Chinese than the Chinese. That’s really ugly IMO.
3 Hermann // May 24, 2007 at 3:24 pm
Yeah, that is correct, Dave, but I also ran into some of my German countrymen, who ‘rediscovered the true meaning’ of Taiji, as the Chinese forgot about it (cynicly). So, for some long periods, it seemed true, that foreigners didn’t get deep enough.
But times have changed, and that’s something the Chinese/Taiwanese don’t like too much.
We train harder and longer, research more thoroughly and play more frankly, we reach good levels of gongfu, know more than lots of older and especially younger Chinese, so we are something like a threat which must be neutralized in anyway possible.
I allways tell them, that the most knowledgable persons on German cultural studies are not Germans, but ousiders who got the perfect objective attitude. But who wants to hear?!
Anyway, keep the good work up, all of Dave’s readers, we have to overcome this way or another way, each in his personal attitude.
And sometimes, we must show our stuff, as you did with the Xingyi teacher.
Any many thanks again for the evening including the nice dinner. Hope to see you down south, and hello to Marc.
4 x // May 24, 2007 at 3:28 pm
Don’t worry about it.
I live in a certain south east asian country, and I had a teacher who keeps complaining of the attitude of the local chinese living there. He says he has never taught any local chinese anything significant. Not surprisingly, I don’t learn from him anymore.
5 seeker6 // May 24, 2007 at 7:41 pm
Many clubs have people like this, but not all. Choose one that doesn’t,especially if the problem is with the teacher.
When meeting someone like this you could always explain that the Chinese could never possibly understand the car, which was invented in the West. Suggest that they stick to wheelbarrows. Hopefully they would have the intelligence to see the ridiculousness of their comments.
To have prejudice is so human. I think the best we can do is recognize it and confront it where possible.
6 chessman71 // May 24, 2007 at 9:28 pm
“When meeting someone like this you could always explain that the Chinese could never possibly understand the car, which was invented in the West. Suggest that they stick to wheelbarrows.”
Okay, that was funny. I might have to use that one in the future.
7 Dojo Rat // May 25, 2007 at 12:13 am
Barbarian and proud of it!
8 Chris @ Martial Development // May 25, 2007 at 3:37 am
Laozi said that, faced with an enlightened man, the tiger will find nowhere to use his claws.
Can someone who throws their senior down repeatedly, truly be said to understand Chinese culture?
9 William // May 25, 2007 at 5:03 am
Interesting and sadly true. It is funny that the mayority of the BS we know about the history of CMA comes from the same guys who critize us barbarians. Sanfeng, Bodhidharma, Shaolin styles and the like are nothing but bluff, the dont want to learn despite of having scholars like professor Ma Mingda and others who really know the real history of the arts. And then they want to lecture us on what is real CMA and what is not…
10 chessman71 // May 25, 2007 at 8:28 am
Chris,
Well, he wasn’t MY senior, now was he? He was a guy that came up to me to play the expert. And then he ambushed me when I joined his class.
So no apologies WHATSOEVER for doing what I did. I tried to show respect to him and his student at all times, even after I threw them. But I’m NOT going to let someone use me as a victim. I guess you didn’t agre with my posts on victimization.
William,
Ma’s latest book couldn’t be published in China, because he tells too much real history. if you’re a fan of his, you’d love it.
11 hakchigi // May 25, 2007 at 10:33 am
I can definitely relate to your post, having been in several Asian countries. Similar issues in Korea…
Having said that I’ve had some very genuine teachers who’ll respect you once you know their language… Ultimately actions speak louder than words anyway.
12 Chris @ Martial Development // May 25, 2007 at 11:45 am
If you are the victim, then what are the people who lost?
13 baichi // May 25, 2007 at 2:26 pm
“If you are the victim, then what are the people who lost?”
A bunch of idiots?
14 Paul_E // May 25, 2007 at 6:15 pm
I’ve been lurking here for a while. I live in beijing and just wanted to respond to Chris. Chris, have you lived in China/Taiwan?
I’m asking because you need to live there to understand where foreigners fit in the grand scheme of things. I’m coming to find out that we really have no place in the traditional Chinese “face” setup. Maybe because of their culture, maybe because of ours. It doesn’t really matter. It’s fine if you want to adapt to the Chinese style of teaching but in my opinion foreigners have no “face,” meaning chinese can do whatever they want to us without worrying about causing us to lose it. So, if you want to respect your martial elders, that’s fine but that doesn’t mean taking bullshit from them because in the few cases I’ve seen so far, the respect doesn’t reciprocate. They’ll like you and even be friendly towards you because you haven’t opposed them. As for the losers, who cares? If an older person commits a harmful crime against a younger one, is the youngster supposed to just let it slide because of his status. Man, this kind of thing really pisses me off. The bottom line, in Chinese culture, people will do what they want until you say something. That goes for everything. If you make a new friend and keep visiting, they’ll expect you to come unless you say that it’s not going to be a regular thing. If you let a teacher punk you out of respect, he or she will keep doing it because you didn’t say anything. You just have to decide whether you want to learn from him or be willing to lose a teacher due to dissent.
15 Paul_E // May 25, 2007 at 6:17 pm
I have met a really cool teacher but he is very low key, doesn’t care about styles if you practice hard, and really likes to fight. So please don’t mistake my rant for racism, it’s just venting some anger at the culture shock.
16 chessman71 // May 25, 2007 at 6:41 pm
Chris,
You’re really missing the point.
I wasn’t a victim here at all. Why? Because I refused to play the game. I wasn’t going to get thrown around just to give him and his senior student face. When he decided to turn it into a challenge of “break the foreigner,” then I did what I had to do. Nothing more. I’m not bragging about it, but I’m not sorry I stuck up for myself either.
You need to really read and ponder what I wrote and what Paul is saying to you here.
17 zenmindsword // May 25, 2007 at 9:02 pm
what has skin color got to do with learning?
what has culture got to learning?
plenty and yet nothing.
if your mind can’t open up to change, to trying out, to having a little faith to go some distance, to losing face over and over to find the way - whatever is your background makes no difference
if you know, you know; if you don’t don’t, you don’t. but don’t be too proud if you know because you might still not really know
18 Paul_E // May 26, 2007 at 1:04 am
zenmindsword, the point is that you have no face to lose. You’re fair game in their mind and the rules don’t apply to you unless you make it known that they do. I’m all for being open and even trying to do things within the constraints of another country’s tradition as I did when I met my girlfriend’s mother. I find it both challenging and interesting, as well as a way of personal growth. On the other hand, letting someone who never plans on teaching you anything continually grind you into the dust because you respect them is stupid by any standard, especially when you have no face to gain by doing it. I think this is why alot of students, foreign and chinese, talk about stealing their teacher’s art. Either because of poor teaching quality or just plain stinginess they’re clever enough to fill in the gaps in teaching themselves and I think their teachers will appreciate them for it. Hopefully they respect these clever guys more for the gold they’ve found on their own than the ones that let themselves be manipulated, regardless of ethnicity.
19 tim fong // May 26, 2007 at 2:43 am
It’s pretty basic. If they won’t teach you but they want to take your money or waste your time…leave.
20 Yuxian // May 26, 2007 at 3:03 am
Just a note, this doesn’t just happen to foreigners but foreign born Chinese who cannot speak Chinese, eg. me. I experienced quite abit of similar situations as described by Dave simply because I didn’t speak any cantonese or mandarin when I first started training. Many Chinese are just dumb arseholes.
21 Chris @ Martial Development // May 26, 2007 at 5:09 am
I did not miss your point. There is a shallow lesson and a deeper lesson to be learned here.
The shallow lesson is about victims and heroes, racism and respect. This is the level of simple dualism and role-playing. It is childish and disconnected from reality.
Did you ever seen that Dave Chappelle skit about “keeping it real”? Long story short: it ended badly.
22 Paul_E // May 26, 2007 at 8:01 am
Chris, I love Chappelle’s show and I see your point,but…have you lived in China/Taiwan?
23 Chris @ Martial Development // May 26, 2007 at 2:07 pm
I have not. Sadly, bad behavior is a worldwide phenomenon.
24 Paul_E // May 26, 2007 at 2:42 pm
I suppose in the end it’s just up to the individual to choose how to respond in a given situation. I just feel that in a foreign country, it’s up to you to create a sense of comfort and security. I’m not saying you should go beat up everyone you meet nor do nothing at all; simply that in China at least, you yourself (as a foreigner) have to set the ground rules as to how the general population will treat you. In a perfect world, this would be unnecessary but blah blah blah. LOL
25 seeker6 // May 26, 2007 at 2:59 pm
Chris, can you explain why talk of racism, respect and victims is childish and disconnected from reality?
Your reference to what I guess must be a TV show is obscure.
26 chessman71 // May 26, 2007 at 5:47 pm
I don’t know what to say. I guess some readers will just have to give me some credit for brains and experience. This encounter wasn’t me just being a jerk, it wasn’t me being proud, it wasn’t just me “not understanding Chinese culture,” etc.
This encounter was getting out of control because a teacher kept pushing the issue until he “won” against me. I tried NUMEROUS times to stop it from happening. I made jokes and endlessly put down my poor skills in an effort to save face for him and get out of this. But in the end, he kept escalating the pressure and I could have gotten hurt.
I DID WHAT I HAD TO DO.
I don’t know what else people want from me.
27 zenmindsword // May 26, 2007 at 8:53 pm
try reading this book - it also touches on this topic which occurs between han chinese and manchurians since the book is about wu style http://www.palgrave-usa.com/catalog/product.aspx?isbn=1403968284. unfortunately the book cost about S$100 even after 20% discount so i just read it in the bookshop
28 james // May 27, 2007 at 4:52 am
I have never lived in an asian culture, but I do live in Latin American culture and the Chessdude´s posts make perfect sense to me. Those how haven´t had to deal with cross cultural “stuff” should be a little more patient before they jump in and tell him he´s wrong
29 Chris @ Martial Development // May 27, 2007 at 4:39 pm
My personal views on the subject of victimization, heroism and role-playing are similar to those of Marc MacYoung. He’s dealt with his share of “stuff” and so have I.
Dave Chappelle is a comedian who performed a series of sketches: “When keeping it real goes wrong”. Implication being that discretion is the better part of valor.
30 Tetsuo // May 29, 2007 at 12:37 pm
Chris, I respect your point, but you’re wrong. I agree that discretion is the better part of valor - and that’s exactly what was exercised here. Discretion doesn’t mean always turning the other cheek, it means having the experience, knowledge, and wisdom to know when the best course of action would be to turn the other cheek, and when it would be to put your foot down and not take any (or any more) shit.
31 GuangMing // Jun 1, 2007 at 2:05 am
Yeah, the whole “you can kick my ass but it’s still not taiji” bit is great. That’s why my usual response is “Yeah, you’re right, it’s Choy Li Fut! I guess your taiji just sucks.”
32 GuangMing // Jun 1, 2007 at 3:51 am
“Can someone who throws their senior down repeatedly, truly be said to understand Chinese culture?”
Who cares? Some people study martial arts for its practical usage, not cultural exchange. The ’senior’ who gets thrown down by his junior may want to respect his Chinese culture more, by actual praxis and application, and not as laymen would have it, by wearing it as an ethnocentric badge.
33 renli // Jun 11, 2007 at 8:11 pm
I have a long history of practising in the park. I made friends with several senior’s groups and practiced with them. If you are living in China and Taiwan and you are all by yourself, you need to get attached to a school, join a group in the park, or avoid contact with other martial artists. Without exception every martial artist who ever came up to me in the park had something to prove. I remember “gabriel”, the instructor of “gabriel’s horn” tai chi in Toronto. He was a decent martial artist, but as so often you see his taijiskills were not very good, as he had a very heavy karate background and still practiced it. We were friends and I lent him among other things my signed copy of jou tsung hwa’s tao of tai chi and other such books over the years. One day he asked to push hands with me. After a few circles he gave me a karate punch me in the stomach, hard. It didn’t wind me, I was able to absorb most of the force, but his attitude was clearly not what I had expected. A few weeks later he returned my book, borrowed too long, but the inside cover was filled with dirt and chocolate smudges and there was children’s writing on many of the pages. He apologized for how he acted in push hands, which I accepted, I guess, but we never really spoke after that.
It is a crying shame that some people are so disrespectful. I do however notice that these are the people who never really figure out what to do next with their taiji.
Go figure.
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34 chessman71 // Jun 11, 2007 at 8:58 pm
Renli,
I have a main teacher that I’ve been with for a while. But i practice in the parks, so I bumped into this guy that I talked about. It was quite the experience and, to be honest, I’m really it happened. I learned a lot from this experience. It has changed everything for me.
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