Hallander, Jane
(Editor/Translator: N/A)

http://www.fightauthority.com/forum/cms_view_article.php?aid=81
Fightauthority.com (2004)

Recommended w/reservation

This article served to highlight the importance of animals in Korean martial arts. As suggested by the author, nearly everyone is familiar with the significance of animals in Chinese martial arts (the Shaolin 5: dragon, crane, snake, tiger and leopard/panther), but other Asian countries have animals as well and these animals have played significant roles in the development of fighting styles unique to these countries.

The author starts out by giving a brief history of Korean martial arts and how over the years the art of kuk sool won was founded by In Hyuk Suh. In describing the development of the art form, the main difference between the application of animal techniques in Chinese martial arts and Korean arts is highlighted. As a result of the practical nature of Korean martial arts, In Hyuk Suh decided that the best way to get maximum value out of animal forms would be to carefully observe the animal, notice why a particular style worked for the animal and then find a way to transform such styles into human technique. This was a philosophy that was vastly different from other Asian arts which simply imitated the animals. The problem with sheer imitation is actually quite simple ﾖ humans are not animals (an illustration used by the author is that most animals have four feet, while humans have two)!

So how does one become the animal? There are five main elements which every fighter should be aware of: strength, power, balance, breathing and practice. By studying how each animal incorporated these elements into its technique and developing methods by which humans could use these techniques, In Hyuk Suh was able to create fighting styles that stayed true to the animals technique but were also ﾓhumanﾔ in nature.

The next section of the article is in my opinion a long-winded, loquacious, highly repetitive entry on certain animals and their significance to the Korean arts. I will concede that I may be a bit harsh in criticizing what other readers may actually admire about the authorﾒs writing style, but I guess I just have not developed a strong enough sense of Eastern philosophy to appreciate the points she was trying to make here. The animals focused on are the dragon, snake, tiger, eagle and crane.

If you can bear the latter half of this article, it actually makes for some pretty interesting reading. In addition to serving its required purpose, the article also provided additional information/history which I found quite entertaining.

Annotated by: Yinka Aje (July 2004)

Martial Arts: other martial art: Kuk sool won, korean

Topics: history |