From Awakening To Transcendence:A Study On Female Wushu Elite Since Modern Times

Women’s Wushu practice were restrained by feudalism in the late Qing Dynasty and early Period of Republic of China,and can be hardly seen in historical documents.During the literature reviewing,it can be noted that the scholars of modern Wushu research hardly take the female Wushu elite into their discussion and study.Only several aspects like female chivalrous images,female contribution in Wushu,modern female Wushu athlete training were selected by their observation.However,women have becoming more participated in all fields of society since modern times thanks to the promotion of ideological emancipation and social opening,and leave their marks in the development of Wushu.Therefore,this study analyzed the influence of female Wushu ists in the process of Wushu inheritance and dissemination through literature research,interviews and online questionnaires,and highlighted the leading role of female Wushu elite,and provided reference for women to learn Wushu and participate in the path of Wushu inheritance and dissemination in the future,through sorting the background,evolution and contribution of women’s Wushu in the development of Wushu since modern times,It concluded as follows:(1)As the national conditions changed and the idea of concept of gender equality became more and more popular,women’s Wushu has experienced from the initially awakening to the transcendence in nowadays.Those unique images of female in the special period,the organization of women’s groups and the efforts made by female Wushu have constantly enhanced the status of women in society and played an important role in breaking the male monopoly in Wushu practice and inheritance,also contributed as a necessary process for women’s Wushu development.(2)When exploring the life experience of female Wushu elite,we found that the transition of society promoted the change of atmosphere and cognition for women practising Wushu,the encouragement of family members promoted the sense of mission of female Wushu to inherit and spread Wushu.(3)With the popularization of school education,the inheritance mode of Wushu changed from teacher-apprentice inheritance to teacher-student inheritance,Wushu forces gradually gathered from folk to the official.When women Wushu elites were given choice of identity role,some of them choose to enter universities or provincial and municipal Wushu training teams,to enter the management system of government sports departments,and trained themselves into outstanding Wushu talents for the country.The role of folk inheritors is no longer the mainstream,but the inheritance of folk Wushu has not been cut off.When the development of competitive Wushu encounters its bottleneck crisis,some of the female Wushu elite in colleges and universities will choose to seek a breakthrough from folk Wushu.As the foundation of Wushu growth,folk Wushu is an important spiritual and cultural resource for Wushu knowledge production.After folk Wushu were listed on the intangible heritage list,folk and local governments interacted and conspired,and folk Wushu became a fashion again.Women Wushu elite choose to return to folk Wushu,to learn and promote folk Wushu and to become a bridge between folk Wushu and official Wushu.At the same time,some women Wushu elite also play the role of external communicators through teaching,exchanges and visiting,performing,recording CDs,publishing books and other ways to preach Wushu.(4)And on the stage of the world mixed Wushu competition(MMA),Zhang Weili’s championship first broke the zero record of China in UFC events.Her great achievements beyond men gave confidence to professional female athletes in Chinese mixed Wushu combat events.At the same time,a number of winners such as Wu Yannan and Yan Xiaonan emerged,adding female strength to China’s development in the field of mixed Wushu combat.(5)Finally,it is pointed out in the summary of the contribution to the female Wushu elite that since modern times,the female Wushu elite has broken the monopoly of the male inheritance of Wushu in the past,at the same time participated in Wushu in multiple ways,and promoted the inheritance of Wushu.