The “Three Prayers to Buddha” section seen in the Wing Chun set Sui Lim Tao. While many modern interpretations of this art coming out of the Ip Man lineage are essentially secular in nature, the Chinese martial arts remain replete with religious imagery and references.

Hot Off the Press!

I am happy to announce that the journal Martial Arts Studies has just released a new special issue focusing on the always popular topic of martial arts, religion and spirituality. The guest editors for this project are Gabriel Facal (Southeast Asia Centre, CASE, Paris) and Laurent Chirop-Reyes (French Centre for Research on Contemporary China in Hong Kong), both of whom will already be well known to readers of this blog and the journal. It is such a pleasure to see their many months of hard work coming to life!

Martial Arts Studies is an interdisciplinary journal presenting academic work of the highest quality. As an imprint of Cardiff University Press it is always free to read by anyone with an internet connection and published under the Creative Commons. I have copied an image of its table of contents below to give everyone a taste of the sorts of topics that are covered.

In the coming weeks I will repost and feature some of these articles here at the blog. Maybe we can start a discussion that we can continue in person when we all meet in Switzerland for our annual conference later this month? But in the mean time, head on over and download a copy of the issue, or maybe start with Gabriel and Laurent’s guest editorial? Enjoy!

To read individual articles or download the entire issue please visit us at https://mas.cardiffuniversitypress.org