protectivearts

ZANSHIN AS THE PRESENTATION OF SELF

Zanshin 残心 is the relaxed state of awareness visibly displayed by the practitioner’s posture at the end of the technique. Often instructors hide behind foreign lexicon to slather a mystic veneer on the martial arts. I am a pragmatic American and for me the terms need a better explanation and translation. I crib the title fromContinue reading “ZANSHIN AS THE PRESENTATION OF SELF”

FLEXIBLE WEAPONS

Brian Pike of Silat Suffian Bela Diri provided an introduction to the scarf as a flexible weapon. Equipment first Flexible weapons as a generic category can include a wide variety of everyday objects – most of which were once readily available objects or farming tools, such as the latigo (whip), chains, rope, and daily dressContinue reading “FLEXIBLE WEAPONS”

Dracula as Historian

I admit to being a fan of the vampire genre: books and movies. Most recently, the BBC produced Dracula released in 2020 on Netflix.[1] It starts as a smart retelling of Bram Stoker’s novel with visual homages to classic movies along the way, but quickly takes new narrative turns. Unfortunately the series had a veryContinue reading “Dracula as Historian”