Talk:Wushu (sport)

Notable Practitioners section
(Also see Talk for "Famous People section") I strongly recommend removing the "Notable Practitioners" section, or renaming/strictly limiting it to past/current practitioners of true public renown outside the sport itself (the most notable example of this would be Jet Li). Otherwise, as can be currently seen in the article, it will continue to be updated with obscure winners of local or regional competitions who are attempting to self-promote. This is a particular problem given the poorly-sourced and nearly-impossible-to-confirm records in China (especially prior to the "international introduction" to the sport in the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games), from which a large base of the sport's figures originate. In addition, there are several notable practitioners who are "famous" for pursuits outside of wushu whom did not actively compete in the sport at a high level. At that point, relevance becomes an issue (and can be assessed independently), as it would be like saying Barack Obama is a "notable Tae Kwon Do practitioner" when in reality he got a green belt at a local McDojo school.

Another recommendation would be to include a separate list of notable competitors or notable competition winners, to differentiate between those who can accurately source the reputation and distinction of their competition victories and those who claim to be 7-time "All China" winners when no such competition exists, or it is in actuality a purposely-misleading translation of what would amount to a regional amateur competition. This problem is endemic everywhere in wushu (i.e., not just in China), as you will see someone claim to be "the undisputed British wushu champion for 12 years" when, at the time, country-wide wushu competition constituted 8 guys from the local traditional Chinese Martial Arts studios prior to the existence of the IWF. Again, to use poor analogy, this would be like someone claiming to be all-Dakotas gymnastics champion when she actually won the only 12-and-unders competition in Sioux Falls. That is a very different accomplishment than someone winning the 2012 Pac-10 gymnastics tournament. Competitions should be distinctly listed and sourced not only for verification, but also assessment of importance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.164.38.170 (talk) 08:54, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

Capitalization
I'm of the notion that the name of the sport Wushu is a proper noun and should thus be capitalized in this context. That is, it should be written "Wushu" instead of "wushu". Any other views on this? - Wintran 03:19, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
 * This is from the IWUF's site: "As a sport, wushu is composed of two disciplines...". So, I'm not sure. Shawnc 19:09, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

True. Now that I think of it, I'm not as certain anymore of what is classified as a proper noun. I mean, not many other sport names are capitalized, right, such as soccer or badminton? I think I retract my previous statement, and are currently leaning towards non-capitalized wushu, though it would be nice to have the question answered by an expert. - Wintran 20:49, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

Wushu is not Olympic sport
It applied for Olympic status, but was rejected. Therefor it doesn't belong to this category --Nitsansh 22:24, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Teachers (a.k.a. Sifu) Outside the Peoples Republic of China section
Is there any real value in the 'Teachers (a.k.a. Sifu) Outside the Peoples Republic of China' section? This looks like a way to plug US schools. I propose removing this entire section all together. If someone is notable enough to be listed here they would qualify for the 'Famous Practicioners' section.


 * yes i agree. even if they meant "Chinese champions now residing abroad and teaching" - this is too broad of a category, there are now dozens of such champions, plus perhaps hundreds of other professional and amatuer level practicioners from China now teaching abroad.   If necessary, a link can be made to a good webpage that lists coaches, such as this one - Wushu Instructor's directory at beijingwushuteam.com  --

Famous People section
Huoyuanjia and Bruce Lee technically did not do "wushu" as a sport. Bruce Lee definitely would not have liked modern wushu as it is because all it does is forms. I think the term is being used interchangeably with traditional chinese martial arts which can also be called wushu in chinese. In this case, i'm not sure if Jackie Chan did wushu either. Donnie Yen didn't specialise in wushu but he did practise wushu for some time. If the title of this article didn't have "sport" in parentheses, it wouldn't seem so out of range.
 * Jackie Chan was brought up in a Chinese opera setting, where a large part of his training was performance-oriented Wushu, which falls under the category of contemporary wushu (what is primarily used in the sport), as opposed to traditional wushu (Chinese Martial Arts). Agreed about Bruce Lee.  He had a bit of training in Wing Chun (traditional wushu, not contemporary), and then went off and did his own thing, taking a bit from here and from there, primarily with goals in line with traditional wushu, and quite divergent from those of contemporary wushu -Erik Harris 12:25, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
 * For the same reasons, Huo Yuanjia doesn't belong in the list of famous contemporary wushu players. He died before contemporary wushu was created.  Both he and Bruce Lee should technically be removed from the famous practitioners section, as they're both famous practitioners of Chinese Martial Arts, not of contemporary wushu. -Erik Harris 12:33, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

The list should be used for notable sport wushu competitors only. I'm also not sure that all of the people on the list are competitors. Shawnc 11:21, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

In which competition did Jacky Wu compete? Shawnc 03:40, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Wu Jing (btw i hate the name 'Jacky' it was just made up by a movie company for the english credits of his movie, he never used that name himself before that), was a member of the Beijing Wushu Team in the early 90s. In the 80s he was a member of the jr. team and then he competed as an adult until 1995 when he left the team to film 'Tai chi 2'.  He is the real deal, a professional level contemporary wushu athlete.    It should be noted that the 'championships'  listed in many of his bios (which are crap, btw) were for individual awards (some of which were while he was a youth competitor I'm pretty sure).  He was never an all-around champion like Jet Li (there's a big difference).  133.5.122.54 02:42, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Contemporary vs. Traditional Wushu
So is there a need to create an article on Traditional Wushu? (Mh, 12 July)
 * No, there isn't, because the article already exists under its English name, Chinese Martial Arts. I guess it wouldn't be inappropriate to create a redirect under Traditional Wushu, though.  BTW, please sign your talk posts, using four tilde's (~).  I signed yours above for you. -Erik Harris 14:48, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
 * For what it's worth, there's been past discussion as to why Chinese martial arts was chosen for the article title instead of Wushu, over at Talk:Wushu (term) -Erik Harris 22:14, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Gymnastics
The nature of exhibition and scoring in wushu competition is highly similar to the floor event in gymnastics and thus adding Floor (gymnastics) under See also is appropriate. Shawnc 03:42, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Difficulty creating internal link
Under "Nandao" in the "Main Events" headings, I attempted to make "butterfly swords" an internal link. It was displayed as a link to a non-existing page, even though "butterfly swords" does indeed have a page in Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_Sword). This isn't a major problem, just something I think should be fixed.


 * Note that its butterfly sword and not butterfly swords. -- mh 13:40, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Confusion over Events
The are entries that are common under Events, Main Events and Other Routines. For instance are Chaquan and Huaquan considered main or other. There are also different translations for different names (Chaquan for instance). Is Hongquan a main event? I suggest a quick clean up.Peter Rehse 06:21, 6 December 2006 (UTC)


 * The article does not point to Huaquan or Chaquan being a main event. The implication is that Changquan is a general term to unify Chaquan, Hongquan, etc. Regarding different translations for different names, this is still a problem and its quite common. How exactly do you suggest we fix this? --mh 08:55, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Ah ok - I misread that - perhaps others will too. As for different translations I only meant within the article itself. They were minor differences but one should aim for consistency.Peter Rehse 09:13, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Not Appropriate
The following sentence in the header section is pretty messed up:

Some authors have surmised that the creation of sport wushu and its subsequent disassociation from self-defense and the traditional closed system of family lineages was an attempt to suppress what the PRC felt was potentially subversive aspects of Chinese martial arts.[1]

My first impression is that this sentence read like your usual anti-PRC propagandas, and the source isn't really a source - you can't source a whole book, you have to be more specific, page number etc. Besides, the book isn't even about the topic at hand. It's a book on martial art techniques written in the 1800th and translated into English in modern time. How can a book talk about PRC before PRC was even created is beyond me.

Besides, you can't really use "Some people say". That type of argument is pointless. Some people say the earth is flat, some people believe wikipedia is full of it. You can't say "some say" without actually saying who those people are!

Also, even if this sentence had credibility, why would it be in the header section? It read like this: Wushu history Wushu history government conspiracy Wushu history Wushu history It's completely out of place. It's not even in the right section, let along credibility.

So at the end, I have deleted it. I will try to check back often to see if anyone reply to this. If you wish to change it back, please state WHY, no point starting edit wars. 24.89.245.62 (talk) 22:23, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks, its deletion was absolutely right. As for "some people say", we even have a guideline against such "weasel wording". › mys id (☎∆) 10:25, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Daniel Wu
Should he not be included in the 'notable' section? 2.25.66.151 (talk) 13:11, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Requested move 3 September 2017

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: not moved (non-admin closure) TheDoctorWho (talk) 23:00, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

– The sport is the clear WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. The other main entry on the disambiguation page, Chinese martial arts, is an umbrella term which includes more than wushu, and is better known in English as kungfu. Zanhe (talk) 18:42, 3 September 2017 (UTC)
 * Wushu (sport) → Wushu
 * Wushu → Wushu (disambiguation)
 * Oppose honestly don't believe either of these is automatic. Particularly to western readers who probably aren't even aware of the difference. Even on zh.wp Wushu is still the broader category and zh:武术 (体育运动) just the sport. In ictu oculi (talk) 19:57, 3 September 2017 (UTC)
 * Chinese usage pattern is completely different and irrelevant to the discussion about English common names. For example, the word kungfu, widely used in English, is rarely used in Chinese. While the term "wushu" is rarely used in English to refer to Chinese martial arts in general. -Zanhe (talk) 22:14, 3 September 2017 (UTC)


 * Support I think most people would be looking for the specific sport not the general overview. Ivar the Boneful (talk) 15:12, 4 September 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose. The English meaning of "wushu" is "Chinese martial arts," according to Merriam-Webster. Wushu should redirect to the Chinese martial arts page. The term encompasses a variety of activities ranging from tai chi to kung fu. The sport promoted by the International Wushu Federation is only one form, and not the best known. Great scott (talk)
 * Oppose Wushu (sport) is a subset of Wushu. I would think that Wushu, as in Chinese martial arts, is the primary topic.PRehse (talk) 17:08, 5 September 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose At some point, we may see a merger request to merge the then-Wushu article with Chinese martial arts. There needs to be a distinct page for sport, and its better having "Wushu (sport)" given the federations surrounding it, than some article called "Chinese martial arts sports competitions". Your proposal creates holes for too many complications. -DA1 (talk) 10:12, 6 September 2017 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Obviously
Chinese martial arts as a sport or not dates earlier than the 1950s. If this is about a specific Chinese organization, name the article correctly. Otherwise, address the entire concept. — Llywelyn II   15:35, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

Mixed gender competitions?
The infobox says "Mixed gender    Yes". Does this mean that all types of competition, including the full-contact version, have both men and women contesting other men and women, including one woman facing one man? If that is not the case, then the word "Yes" needs to be clarified. Jeff in CA (talk) 06:53, 10 July 2019 (UTC)