What is the martial arts style that uses weapons for attack and defense?

Question

My husband is looking for a style of martial arts that mimics a 'real' fight and teaches self defense against weapons.

Answer 1

Many styles teach weapons defense skills as part of their studies. It is a key part of self defense. Martial skills courses are going to foccus more on this sort of thing.

If you want something that concentrates on weapons defense, perhaps Krav Magna would work.

Answer 2

Many disciplines use weapons in their curriculums, but most of them use the weapons clases as a secondary or addition to the main curriculum which is often the empty handed defenseive side of the discipline.

Any Martial Art can use weapons for attack and defense, but it depends on your choice as to what discipline you want to study

Krav Maga uses defense and disarming techniques which comprise the bulk of the training, but it is a very vicious and straight to the point discipline.

other disciplines (particularly Kung Fu, the cumulative name for the Chinese Martial Arts) like Wushu can incorporate a heavy use of weapons techniques, but again that depends on the school you choose

I suggest you or your husband really look into what you want specifically out of learning a discipline. and then look to see if a school in your area teaches weapons classes

Answer 3

Street fighting and MMA 'prize fighting' are two different animals. MMA is not a complete system of self-defense. Any complete system of self-defense takes a long time to learn (think 6-10 years) and includes: weapons training and weapons defense; kata; kumite; tournament wins; and multiple attack and defense scenarios. Lots and lots of practice in the dojang/dojo/kwoon to become a proficient street defense expert. In my day (1968 to the present) only 1 outta 15 students 'earned' their black belts. Today the martial arts are a bit lax (even MMA is lax).

Answer 4

The best self-defence against a weapon is to learn to USE that weapon.

Truth is that many classes offer so called "weapons defence", most of these are garbage and give you a false sense of security against a weapon that will only get your husband killed.

Any act against a weapon is at heart a desperation move. there might be some technique to it, but if you are disarming a knife, you WILL get cut, if you are attempting to disarm a gun then you best believe in luck.

Weapons kill, period.

Learning unarmed self-defence against a weapon is a difficult task at best. Even a master is at a HUGE disadvantage when facing a weapon.

Look up the dog brothers weapons classes they do legit weapons training.

There is a line where even if you have a weapon, you need to safely be able to draw it, this might be more what your husband wants. Of course you might not feel comfortable with him walking around with a knife or a gun.

Answer 5

Its a Martial Arts style used by Steven Segal called Aikido. It teaches how to fight with swords, knives, martial arts weapons, etc, plus teaches how to best defend against them. Google Aikido and check out some of the stuff they teach and also put your suburb in the search to find a dojo near you. I'm pretty sure this is the one you are after...

Answer 6

There are many. If you are looking for weapons training you could do Kenjitsu, similar to Kendo but more practical in application. Kendo and Kenjitsu use swords primarily.

If you're looking for more well rounded weapons training join a Kung Fu, Wushu or Karate dojo that has weapons training as well and specify that it is what you're looking for.

If you want to defend yourself in a street fight learn Ju Jitsu (I recommend Brazilian style), Jeet Kun Do or Aikido. Ju Jitsu (yes, this is the Americanized spelling, there are at least 4 others I know of) is primarily a grappling art originated in Feudal Japan as a way for the Samurai to defend himself when unarmed. It has many holds, throws, blocks and weapon disarms that work very well in street fights. Brazilian Ju Jitsu adds more attacks as well and has worked very well in the extremely violent inner cities of Brazil to curb gang violence. The Gracie family are the supreme experts at Brazilian Ju Jitsu.

Jeet Kun Do is the art designed by master Bruce Li, made famous for his martial arts movies. Bruce Li is one of the few martial arts stars to actually be a master before making movies. He mastered classical Kung Fu and Okinawan Karate before learning some Ju Jitsu and Kendo. He found that many of the forms of the classical arts felt useless to him. he removed them and sped up many of the attacks he learned from the different styles. He also upped the aggression level making for a very deadly martial art, though very physically demanding.

Aikido is another art from Feudal Japan, it is basically the sword forms of Kenjitsu but unarmed. Strangely the Samurai found that doing the sword forms without weapons worked very well on their own as a defensive art. Almost entirely defensive Aikido has now adapted to use medical science to improve the grips, take downs and pressure point systems that it had classically. In Feudal Japan some Samurai chose to learn Aikido rather then Ju Jitsu as their unarmed defense. Aikido gained popularity toward the end of the Feudal age until it almost disappeared as the modern era entered Japan. It has made a resurgence in the US and UK as a very effective but almost entirely defensive art.

All three of these will teach good self defense for "the streets". Many other schools will work fine as well. But these three tend to focus on practical application more then the traditional Karate and Kung Fu schools. Check your local Dojo's for more information though, you may have a great Karate school right down the street and my info may be useless to you.

Answer 7

Please excuse me in advance for "going off" a bit with this. First, no dojo or school is going to teach "real" fighting. This is because in a so-called "real" fight, someone is going to get HURT. You simply cannot train someone to break an attacker's knee, or elbow, or gouge out someone's eyes in a school. I mean we try our best to simulate these things, but to do it "for real" someone is going to get seriously hurt and no one would want to pay money and join a school when you know you are taking a chance of getting crippled in every class. Sparring classes in a traditional Karate dojo are as close as we can get both legally and morally to a "real" fight. I am sick of hearing people who say that sparring isn't "real" or something to the effect of "sparring in a Dojo won't prepare you for a real street fight." Just because I don't allow some 17 year old Green Belt to attempt to break your knee in my class doesn't mean my classes are not effective self defense. Just because I don't allow a student to hit you full force in the face doesn't mean the sparring session isn't realistic. It is merely what we can do without it being needlessly dangerous.
Whew...OK, I'm done. Now, absolutely ANYTHING you learn from any decent instructor will help you in any "real" fight- even if all you learn is how to block properly you are ahead. As for weapons, almost every style has weapons defense techniques to teach. Some work better than others of course, and absolutely NO technique is going to work in every possible situation. If there were an easy way to deal with weapons, no one would use them in an attack. When facing ANY weapon there is a much greater chance of you getting seriously hurt, so the best defense it to just give the guy what he wants. Unless of course, you think you're gonna get hurt anyway, in which case you have nothing to lose.
Bottom line, if you want "real" join a gang. They learn and use all kinds of serious weapons and bare handed techniques every day, practice them in real life situations and have a great chance of getting KILLED every time they step out of the door in the morning. If you want something a little less "realistic" but something that is better morally, ethically and may even teach you things like respect, honor and self discipline along with self defense as realistic as we can get it, then by all means investigate martial arts schools in your area and find a good instructor. We ALL try as best we can to give our students the most realistic training we can without being needlessly dangerous.
Hope this helps, and sorry again for the sermon...
Sensei Cox

Answer 8

Bujinkan budo taijutsu (also called ninjutsu) teaches that the body and anything that is available to use is a weapon against our attackers. We learn to use the body as well as a wide variety of weapons to defend, counter and attack an opponent.

Answer 9

check out any Filipino martial art.
CQC does it.
Krav Maga also.
Some tradtional arts do, but the weapons are as relevant. who uses sai anymore?

Answer 10

Look up Kali-Escrima-Arnis. It's an art that trains single stick, double stick, dagger, empty hands, and any variation of what I just mentioned. It has attack moves as well as defensive moves.