what is the diff between different types of martial arts like kung fu and karate?

Answer 1

the spelling....

Answer 2

Be wary when you choose martial arts schools, particularly with karate. While the original karate is just as effective a martial art as any once mastered, it has been diluted over the generations and commercialized by money-mongrels who are only interested in profits. The fighting style also differs greatly, being a more rigid form of fighting which may prove to be impractical in a real self-defense scenario. I personally took a form of Kung Fu for about 6 years, and found it to be not only practical, but effective from the very beginning. I was fortunate to have an outstanding instructor, and recognize the fact that my good experience with Kung Fu could very well differ from that of another person and another instructor. You should note that the original Kung Fu practitioners were driven out of China many years ago, for fear that they would rise up against the leadership. Much of what Kung Fu originally was, was lost during that time. Plenty still remains, however, and still makes an excellent fighting style choice.

Answer 3

There are a lot of arts, and they're all different. It's a little like asking what makes a Honda Civic different from a Toyota Carola. They're both cars, but they're different. Martial Arts can be the same way.

Karate was developed in Japan, Kung Fu was developed in China. Karate has several sub-styles, as does Kung Fu. Some forms of Karate were imports of styles from Korea, others were imported from China, others are a mixture of both.

Karate was primarily the styles in Japan that were learned by the lower class, the poor. The Chinese Martial Arts were often developed by higher society. In Japan, I think Kendo was the Martial Art for High Society. Since Karate was learned by the poor, it was made to be learned quickly. Since Shaolin Kung Fu was developed at a monestary, it was made to go into depth. My teacher always used to tell the parable of the three boys:

Three boys, we'll call them Karry, Kert, and Tyler, of equal size and strength got into a fight, and there was no clear winner. So Karry joined a Karate school, and Kert joined a Kung Fu school, and Tyler joined a Tai Chi school. Six moths later, Karry challenged the other two to a fight and won. Two years later, Kert challenged Karry to a rematch and won. Ten years later, they all met at a bar, and Tyler laughed at the other two's "sloppy" techniques, so they both challenged him to a fight, and he easily outmatched both of them.

For that reason, and many others, I find question such as "which is best, Karate or Kung Fu" to be silly. Each has its place.

Answer 4

Like Kung Fu, Karate is actually based from Chinese Martial Arts.

the main differences are where the different disciplines were developed, Karate was originally learned in China then brought back and developed by the founders in Japan and Okinawa.

but they are essentially the same techniques, just modified or evolved to work better for the individual who founded those disciplines.

Answer 5

Kung Fu (properly called Shaolin Boxing) has many varieties. Northern Kung Fu is similar to Tae Kwon Do as both emphasize kicking, particularly high kicks. Southern Shaolin was the father of Okinawan Karate & emphasizes hand techniques & strong stances. Japanese Karate is in between these 2. There are also a number of grappling styles, Hapkido, Aikido, Jujitsu & others. Since I practice a kicking style (Tae Kwon Do) I'm not qualified to discuss grappling styles.

Answer 6

Well technically "karate" refers to the okinawan martial arts systems and "kung fu" just means "hard work" which is a generic term for all martial arts.

However most people refer to "kung fu" as CMA or Chinese Martial Arts.

It would be way too detailed to go into the differences between each system of each, but basically the major difference between japanese and chinese systems is that CMA tends to be more flowing one strike to the next and japanese MAs are best described as short and choppy, That is a generalization and not true in all cases but the individual differences between each style of karate can be as different as comparing karate to CMA in general, same goes with CMA. The individual differences and thought processes and theories can be as different as comparing tennis to bjj.

This is the "theory" side of it though, in practice whether a karate or CMA school is any good or particular teacher is any good is a whole different animal.

Answer 7

That is a very broad question indeed, that's like asking what is the difference between the Chinese & Japanese, the US & UK, etc.

Apart from having different orgins, there's also the fact that martial arts have sort of 4 aspects

Internal, External, Soft & Hard for an explanation on this go here: http://www.martialforum.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=94

I have also included a link on the orgins & a general overview for you to read:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martial_arts

Hope this helps

Answer 8

Well. Karate was developed in Korea.

Kung Fu is older and was developed in China.

They all differ in moves and in style.

Bruce Lee originally was trained in Kung Fu, but later developed his own style Joon Kee-Do (I think) which used all forms of martial arts including boxing.

Answer 9

Please view the following sites to get some idea of what differences do exist.

http://www.pacificwingchunassociation.com
http:www.wingchunassociation.com
http://www.wingchunassoc.com

L.Ramirez
http://www.pacificwingchunassociation.com