Did I ever tell you about when I used to make swords for belly dancers?
That was a great gig. When it comes to figuring out how best to balance a shamshir on a woman's hip, there's just no substitute for experience. :)
The word for martial (wu 武) is a ****phone for the word for dance (wu 舞). It's a point that most any CMa researcher has come across and is well reiterated by Lorge. Like I've said earlier, I've never had issues with martial dancers. I tell ya, working with those belly dancers sold me over. But seriously, dance is great. The only issue I have is with martial dancers who claim they are fighters. I have issues there in the same way I have issues with anyone who make false or deluded claims. But that's a separate issue entirely. For the martial arts to grow, we need to embrace all of our permutations. It's not just about who can beat down who in the cage. Kung fu is about hard earned skill. Fighting skill is just one aspect of it. Certainly all martial arts should be rooted in martial skills, but I'm not about to exclude dancers. They make better movies. ;)
Coincidentally, we just had the Beijing Wushu Team in our studio yesterday. They were a great group of young athletes - fun, friendly, enthusiastic and in fantastic condition. They weren't fighters, although I wouldn't write them off entirely. They were fast and accurate in peak physical condition, highly competitive, and given a sharp, many of them could get the job done.
Dancing and flowery crap have been part of CMA for centuries
Didn't I say that already? Movies are new. That's only been the last few decades. Videogames are even newer. I imagine they've had some impact. I remember after Crouching Tiger came out, I had a student ask me, in all seriousness, when we were going to learn how to fly. Of course, that was over a decade ago now.
Actually, from the inside, TCMA is not shrinking. It's not really growing, but it's not really shrinking either. The market is about the same as it ever was, barring that huge boost we got back in the Bruce Lee days. I'm not sure where that myth got started. Karate is shrinking. TKD is about the same. MMA is growing, obviously. This is based on seeing accounts from Tiger Claw, which is one of the nation's largest suppliers to schools and stores. The economy has been hard on martial arts schools across the board, but in terms of proportional slices of the pie, TCMA certainly isn't shrinking, once you adjust for the general recession.
I will say that the most detrimental effect modern wushu has had on TCMA has been weapons manufacturing. Now, the bulk of the market is skewed towards wushu weapons. As a weapons maker myself, that sucks. There are still some really fine high-end pieces, even better quality than previously, but the market isn't supporting them as much as it is going for cheap weapons. This is exacerbated by the growing economic strength of China, which is where the bulk of martial arts weapons for all styles are made nowadays. I'm hoping that when the economy improves, we'll see a swing back.
oh, and for the record...
the most recent duan system propounded by the IWuF requires the talou practitioner to demonstrate a certain number of applications per routine to achieve ranking...but i'm sure most of you knew that ;)