Game of text: Bruce Lee’s media legacies

Abstract

This article situates Bruce Lee at the heart of the emergence of ‘martial arts’. It argues that the notion ‘martial arts’, as we now know it, is a discursive entity that emerged in the wake of media texts, and that the influence of Bruce Lee films of the early 1970s was both seminal and structuring of ‘martial arts’, in ways that continue to be felt. Using the media theory proposition that a limited range of ‘key visuals’ structure the aesthetic terrain of the discursive entity ‘martial arts’, the article assesses the place, role and status of images of Bruce Lee as they work intertextually across a wide range of media texts. In so doing, the article demonstrates the enduring media legacy of Bruce Lee – one that has always overflowed the media realm and influenced the lived, embodied lifestyles of innumerable people the world over, who have seen Bruce Lee and other martial arts texts and gone on to study Chinese and Asian martial arts because of them.

From Chop Suey to Chop-Socky: The Construction of Chineseness in British Television Adverts

“…Both within one media context and beyond it -out into the wider world of other media, and other cultural and social contexts -clusters of connotations can coalesce into 'discursive entities' (Foucault 1978;Bowman 2019b;2019c). From wherever it may have been 'born' -an irreducibly complex process of multiple histories of European expansion, travellers' tales, colonial imperatives, wars, treaties, cultural anxieties, and more -the discursive entity of Chineseness has taken root in different media environments (art, advertising/communication techniques or strategies.…”

“…From wherever it may have been 'born' -an irreducibly complex process of multiple histories of European expansion, travellers' tales, colonial imperatives, wars, treaties, cultural anxieties, and more -the discursive entity of Chineseness has taken root in different media environments (art, advertising/communication techniques or strategies. Rather, the interest in this work is in establishing and interrogating the main ways that the recurrent semiotic construct or discursive entity that I am calling 'Chineseness' has been constructed in one the context of British television adverts (Barthes 1957;Bowman 2017;2019c). The reasons for this focus are ethical and political.…”

Martial Arts, Health, and Society

“…Social science literature, however, especially those studies produced within the disciplinary interests of "martial arts and combat sports (MACS)" (e.g., Farrer and Whalen-Bridge, 2011;Sánchez-García and Spencer, 2013;, and "martial arts studies" (Bowman, 2014, have so far contributed to provide a picture of martial arts as first and foremost a fearsome activity dominated by action, physical confrontation and violence. This literature has extensively inquired into the history, developments and deployments of many martial arts (e.g., Green and Svinth, 2003) and their deconstruction (e.g., Bowman, 2019a), focusing especially on their "culture of combats" (e.g., Sánchez-García and Spencer, 2013;, pedagogical environments, processes of apprenticeship, and knowledge transmission (e.g., Wacquant, 2004;Brown, 2005Brown, , 2011Downey, , 2008Spencer, , 2014Brown and Jennings, 2011;Downey et al, 2015;Jennings et al, 2020), embodiment and sensuous involvement (e.g., Stephens and Delamont, 2006;Samudra, 2008;Farrer and Whalen-Bridge, 2011;Jennings, 2013;Telles et al, 2018), religious and spiritual bearings (e.g., Maliszewski, 1996;Jennings et al, 2010;Brown, 2013;Tuckett, 2016;, and media representations (e.g., Brown et al, 2008;Jakubowska et al, 2016;Yip, 2017;Bowman, 2019bBowman, ,c,d, 2020aTrausch, 2019). Moreover, as this body of work increases, specializes and further develops, also its attention to conceptual clarity and theoretical developments intensifies, with the consequent introduction of a host of new concepts and theoretical perspectives (e.g., Sánchez-García and Spencer, 2013;Cynarski a...…”

Blending Martial Arts and Yoga for Health: From the Last Samurai to the First Odaka Yoga Warrior

“…Social science literature, however, especially those studies produced within the disciplinary interests of “martial arts and combat sports (MACS)” (e.g., Farrer and Whalen-Bridge, 2011 ; Sánchez-García and Spencer, 2013 ; Channon and Jennings, 2014 ), and “martial arts studies” (Bowman, 2014 , 2015 , 2017 , 2018 ), have so far contributed to provide a picture of martial arts as first and foremost a fearsome activity dominated by action, physical confrontation and violence. This literature has extensively inquired into the history, developments and deployments of many martial arts (e.g., Green and Svinth, 2003 ) and their deconstruction (e.g., Bowman, 2019a ), focusing especially on their “culture of combats” (e.g., Sánchez-García and Spencer, 2013 ; Brown et al, 2019 ), pedagogical environments, processes of apprenticeship, and knowledge transmission (e.g., Wacquant, 2004 ; Brown, 2005 , 2011 ; Downey, 2005 , 2008 ; Spencer, 2009 , 2014 ; Brown and Jennings, 2011 ; Downey et al, 2015 ; Jennings et al, 2020 ), embodiment and sensuous involvement (e.g., Stephens and Delamont, 2006 ; Samudra, 2008 ; Farrer and Whalen-Bridge, 2011 ; Spencer, 2011 , 2012 ; Jennings, 2013 ; Channon and Jennings, 2014 ; Southwood and Delamont, 2018 ; Telles et al, 2018 ), religious and spiritual bearings (e.g., Maliszewski, 1996 ; Brown et al, 2009 , 2014 ; Jennings et al, 2010 ; Brown, 2013 ; Tuckett, 2016 ; Pedrini, 2020 ), and media representations (e.g., Brown et al, 2008 ; Jakubowska et al, 2016 ; Yip, 2017 ; Bowman, 2019b , c , d , 2020a , b ; Trausch, 2019 ). Moreover, as this body of work increases, specializes and further develops, also its attention to conceptual clarity and theoretical developments intensifies, with the consequent introduction of a host of new concepts and theoretical perspectives (e.g., Brown and Jennings,…”