Library Guides: Martial Arts & Tai Chi: Scholarly Research into Martial Arts

best databases

If you are wanting to be sure that you search the entire literature, I would use both of the below databases. If you are really wanting to use only one, I would go with Physical Education Index primarily as this will yield more results than would PubMed on these types of topics. Pubmed's focus is more on biochemical and medical sciences, so you will get results in that database but Physical Education Index should be more along the lines of what you are wanting for results.

Sports Medicine and Education Index This link opens in a new window
Journals, conference proceedings and report literature in kinesiology; sport law, sports medicine, dance, motor learning, recreation, standardized fitness tests, sports equipment, coaching and sport sociology/psychology, as well as physical education itself.
PubMed This link opens in a new window
PubMed provides over 22 million citations for biomedical and life sciences literature, including: biomedicine and health, behavioral sciences, bioengineering, biochemistry, genetics, molecular and cell biology.
PubMed tutorial

some other books I like

The Art of Self: An interpretation of traditional Taekwon-Do by David Ippen
Call Number: GV1114.9 I67 2015 Floor 2
ISBN: 9783777423920
Publication Date: 2015-02-15
Taekwon-do is a well-trod path to self-improvement, an "art of self." The philosophy of taekwon-do is simple yet profoundly powerful: To cultivate a strong body and sound ethical and moral character in each practitioner is to contribute to a more peaceful world. If you practice, you will develop increased physical fitness, but you will also discover new stores of mental and spiritual strength. David Ippen is a fifth-degree black belt and a Grandmaster in taekwon-do. He has taught traditional taekwon-do since 1995 and opened a dojang, the Traditional Taekwon-Do Center in Honolulu, in 2009. The Art of Self is the culmination of almost twenty years of intense study and practice, offering Ippen's interpretation of the traditional taekwon-do philosophy. Elucidating the aspects of a taekwon-do practice, Ippen guides practitioners and non-practitioners alike through an accessible process for incorporating the moral and philosophical precepts of taekwon-do to achieve an empowered and harmonious state of mind.

Keywords to use when searching databases for literature on the Martial Arts.

Martial Arts is the top level keyword. Searching this topic is generally pretty simple. You should use the overarching term as well as any more specific terms for the particular martial arts style IF you know that you are wanting to restrict your literature results to that field, e.g. tae kwon do I would search:

"martial arts" AND "tae kwon do"

or maybe

"martial arts" AND Judo

etc...

Why do I have quotation marks? Because when you search (most) databases, this strategy of using quotation marks means that you want to search that exact phrase. In the above example, if you were to search for martial arts without the quotation marks, that means you are telling the database to search for both words martial and the word arts, and to show you the results of all articles that have both of those words. However, by using quotation marks, you are telling the database to search for the phrase martial arts. This is a powerful technique for searching when you are using a common phrase such as is the case here. Other examples of phrases to search using quotation marks might be "self defense", "physical therapy", "higher education", and "tai chi".

recent articles on health/wellness and martial arts from PubMed

A few scholarly e-books on martial arts

Striking Beauty by Barry Allen
Call Number: e-book only
ISBN: 9780231172721
Publication Date: 2015-08-04
The first book to focus on the intersection of Western philosophy and the Asian martial arts, Striking Beauty comparatively studies the historical and philosophical traditions of martial arts practice and their ethical value in the modern world. Expanding Western philosophy's global outlook, the book forces a theoretical reckoning with the concerns of Chinese philosophy and the aesthetic and technical dimensions of martial arts practice. Striking Beauty explains the relationship between Asian martial arts and the Chinese philosophical traditions of Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism, in addition to Sunzi's Art of War. It connects martial arts practice to the Western concepts of mind-body dualism and materialism, sports aesthetics, and the ethics of violence. The work ameliorates Western philosophy's hostility toward the body, emphasizing the pleasure of watching and engaging in martial arts, along with their beauty and the ethical problem of their violence.
Chinese Martial Arts by Peter A. Lorge
ISBN: 9780521878814
Publication Date: 2011-12-05
In the global world of the twenty-first century, martial arts are practised for self-defense and sporting purposes only. However, for thousands of years, they were a central feature of military practice in China and essential for the smooth functioning of society. This book, which opens with an intriguing account of the very first female martial artist, charts the history of combat and fighting techniques in China from the Bronze Age to the present. This broad panorama affords fascinating glimpses into the transformation of martial skills, techniques and weaponry against the background of Chinese history, the rise and fall of empires, their governments and their armies. Quotations from literature and poetry, and the stories of individual warriors, infuse the narrative, offering personal reflections on prowess in the battlefield and techniques of engagement. This is an engaging and readable introduction to the authentic history of Chinese martial arts.
Martial Arts and the Body Politic in Meiji Japan by Denis Gainty
ISBN: 9781135069902
Publication Date: 2013-08-22
In 1895, the newly formed Greater Japan Martial Virtue Association (Dainippon Butokukai) held its first annual Martial Virtue Festival (butokusai) in the ancient capital of Kyoto. The Festival marked the arrival of a new iteration of modern Japan, as the Butokukai's efforts to define and popularise Japanese martial arts became an important medium through which the bodies of millions of Japanese citizens would experience, draw on, and even shape the Japanese nation and state. This book shows how the notion and practice of Japanese martial arts in the late Meiji period brought Japanese bodies, Japanese nationalisms, and the Japanese state into sustained contact and dynamic engagement with one another. Using a range of disciplinary approaches, Denis Gainty shows how the metaphor of a national body and the cultural and historical meanings of martial arts were celebrated and appropriated by modern Japanese at all levels of society, allowing them to participate powerfully in shaping the modern Japanese nation and state.
The Creation of Wing Chun: A Social History of the Southern Chinese Martial Arts by Benjamin N. Judkins; Jon Nielson
ISBN: 1438456956
Publication Date: 2015-07-16
Looks at southern Chinese martial arts traditions and how they have become important to local identity and narratives of resistance.

Here is a link to a basic search in our catalog looking for e-books that we have access to. After selecting the link, use the facets on the right side of the page to focus your results to, for example, restricted publication date(s), major topic areas, or classification areas.

e-books on martial arts, click here to see our catalog with results

The link above is for e-books only. We also have a print selection. To see the books that we have available in print on (in general) martial arts, click here!

Anita Kay

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Subjects: Agriculture, Biological Sciences, Human Development & Family Studies, Kinesiology, Psychology