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“Hang the Flesh off the Bones”: Cultivating an “Ideal Body” in Taijiquan and Neigong

In a globalized, media-driven society, people are being exposed to different cultural and philosophical ideas. In Europe, the School of Internal Arts (pseudonym) follows key principles of the ancient Chinese text The Yijinjing (The Muscle-Tendon Change Classic) “Skeleton up, flesh down”, in its onli...

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Autores principales: Ma, Xiujie, Jennings, George
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8122597/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33919260
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18094417
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author Ma, Xiujie
Jennings, George
author_facet Ma, Xiujie
Jennings, George
author_sort Ma, Xiujie
collection PubMed
description In a globalized, media-driven society, people are being exposed to different cultural and philosophical ideas. In Europe, the School of Internal Arts (pseudonym) follows key principles of the ancient Chinese text The Yijinjing (The Muscle-Tendon Change Classic) “Skeleton up, flesh down”, in its online and offline pedagogy. This article draws on an ongoing ethnographic, netnographic and cross-cultural investigation of the transmission of knowledge in this atypical association that combines Taijiquan with a range of practices such as Qigong, body loosening exercises and meditation. Exploring the ideal body cultivated by the students, we describe and illustrate key (and often overlooked) body areas—namely the spine, scapula, Kua and feet, which are continually worked on in the School of Internal Arts’ exercise-based pedagogy. We argue that Neigong and Taijiquan, rather than being forms of physical education, are vehicles for adult physical re-education. This re-education offers space in which mind-body tension built over the life course are systematically released through specific forms of attentive, meditative exercise to lay the foundations for a strong, powerful body for martial artistry and health.
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spelling pubmed-81225972021-05-16 “Hang the Flesh off the Bones”: Cultivating an “Ideal Body” in Taijiquan and Neigong Ma, Xiujie Jennings, George Int J Environ Res Public Health Article In a globalized, media-driven society, people are being exposed to different cultural and philosophical ideas. In Europe, the School of Internal Arts (pseudonym) follows key principles of the ancient Chinese text The Yijinjing (The Muscle-Tendon Change Classic) “Skeleton up, flesh down”, in its online and offline pedagogy. This article draws on an ongoing ethnographic, netnographic and cross-cultural investigation of the transmission of knowledge in this atypical association that combines Taijiquan with a range of practices such as Qigong, body loosening exercises and meditation. Exploring the ideal body cultivated by the students, we describe and illustrate key (and often overlooked) body areas—namely the spine, scapula, Kua and feet, which are continually worked on in the School of Internal Arts’ exercise-based pedagogy. We argue that Neigong and Taijiquan, rather than being forms of physical education, are vehicles for adult physical re-education. This re-education offers space in which mind-body tension built over the life course are systematically released through specific forms of attentive, meditative exercise to lay the foundations for a strong, powerful body for martial artistry and health. MDPI 2021-04-21 /pmc/articles/PMC8122597/ /pubmed/33919260 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18094417 Text en © 2021 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Ma, Xiujie
Jennings, George
“Hang the Flesh off the Bones”: Cultivating an “Ideal Body” in Taijiquan and Neigong
title “Hang the Flesh off the Bones”: Cultivating an “Ideal Body” in Taijiquan and Neigong
title_full “Hang the Flesh off the Bones”: Cultivating an “Ideal Body” in Taijiquan and Neigong
title_fullStr “Hang the Flesh off the Bones”: Cultivating an “Ideal Body” in Taijiquan and Neigong
title_full_unstemmed “Hang the Flesh off the Bones”: Cultivating an “Ideal Body” in Taijiquan and Neigong
title_short “Hang the Flesh off the Bones”: Cultivating an “Ideal Body” in Taijiquan and Neigong
title_sort “hang the flesh off the bones”: cultivating an “ideal body” in taijiquan and neigong
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8122597/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33919260
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18094417
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