Martial Arts and Combat Sports. Towards the General Theory of Fighting Arts

The contents of the book consist of thirteen chapters (excluding the introduction and summary). They concern the following issues: a review of the most important theoretical approaches; state of knowledge on martial arts; self-defence against martial arts theory; expressive martial arts and their evolution; participation of martial arts in the policy of promoting national culture; the role of training; the role of women in martial arts fighting; relationship between the different Asian martial arts in social structure; the presence of Christianity in martial arts; and short studies on the elements of combat in rugby, kenjutsu, ido and yoga. The whole study is supplemented with an extensive bibliography.