Internal and External Styles
Chinese martial arts may be divided into neijia (內家, internal family) or wàijiā (外家, external family) styles.
Many styles combine both internal and external techniques; Chow Gar is a good example of this.
There is an ongoing debate within the martial arts community at both the popular and scholarly level over the distinction between "internal" and "external" arts. Consequently, the list of styles considered internal or external may vary greatly from source to source. There are only three Chinese styles that are universally recognized as internal, and they are sometimes referred to as the "Orthodox internal styles." These three styles are Xingyiquan, Baguazhang, and T'ai chi ch'uan (Taijiquan), the three arts counted as internal and set apart by Sun Lutang, who greatly popularized the terms "neijia" and "wàijiā" as a method of classifying martial arts.
Read more about this topic: List Of Chinese Martial Arts
Famous quotes containing the words internal, external and/or styles:
“I believe that there was a great age, a great epoch when man did not make war: previous to 2000 B.C. Then the self had not really become aware of itself, it had not separated itself off, the spirit was not yet born, so there was no internal conflict, and hence no permanent external conflict.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)
“The ideal of brotherhood of man, the building of the Just City, is one that cannot be discarded without lifelong feelings of disappointment and loss. But, if we are to live in the real world, discard it we must. Its very nobility makes the results of its breakdown doubly horrifying, and it breaks down, as it always will, not by some external agency but because it cannot work.”
—Kingsley Amis (1922–1995)
“For the introduction of a new kind of music must be shunned as imperiling the whole state; since styles of music are never disturbed without affecting the most important political institutions.”
—Plato (c. 427–347 B.C.)