Introduction
Through Via Media’s publications, we offer an opportunity for many to share their research with readers around the world. The results of this work has brought many into contact with one another, inspiring and stimulating further research in this field. This has helped people exchange points of view and current interpretations concerning a subject that obviously interests all of us and, in many cases, has even give a singular professional direction to our lives, motivating and fulfilling them in unique ways that may be difficult - if not impossible - to attain elsewhere. This subject, of course, is the martial arts in all their diversity of methodologies, practices, theories, cultural backgrounds, and forms of etiquette. Although I am focusing the scope of this presentation to the Asian traditions, the ideas presented here can be applied to Western traditions as well.

The Common View
Outside the academic realm, most discussions concerning Asian martial arts focus on a particular style or on comparing styles, especially their repertoire of techniques, sometimes bits and pieces of history and seasoned with philosophical proverbs and parables from the “mysterious East.” These discussions usually are based on a common perception of the martial arts largely obtained through the mass media - an entertainment industry strongly based more on creative fantasy than concrete fact. This has lead to further variations on the theme which we see in extreme forms such as cartoon animations and video games.

Another influential source that has affected our perception of the Asian martial arts is martial arts instructors themselves. Of the thousands teaching today, most have only a superficial familiarity with the cultures in which the arts they teach originated. As a result, very few instructors have fully grasped the technical, historical, and philosophical fullness of their martial systems.