# From Kung Fu Tea - Sophia Delza, an American Taiji Quan Pioneer.



## Xue Sheng (Oct 11, 2014)

Imagine the Chinese Martial Arts without Bruce Lee: Sophia Delza, an American Taiji Quan Pioneer.



> Assume that we find ourselves in a very specific,  recognizable alternate universe.  It is almost exactly like ours, but in  this world Bruce Lee never came to America.  Maybe he got along fine  with his father and simply followed him into Taiji and the Hong Kong  film industry.  Would this have affected the development of the  traditional Chinese martial arts in the west?
> 
> I think there can be no doubt that the answer would  be yes.  On the one hand I still believe that the Chinese martial arts  would have been introduced and popularized without Bruce Lee.  Other  Asian arts, like Judo and Karate were growing and finding a receptive  audience.  It is clear to me after conducting an extensive literature  survey of the period (including every article published in _Black Belt Magazine_  in the 1960s) that readers were interested in and actively seeking out  information on other traditional fighting systems.  Given the importance  of the Chinese arts to the development of the more popular Japanese  systems, and the large number of Americans coming into contact with them  in Taiwan, it is clear that eventually they would have found a  following in the west.  I do not think that individuals like R. W. Smith  or Don F. Draeger would have had any trouble finding an audience for  their books without Lee.



Best Tai Chi Videos Online ? Sophia Delza Performing Wu Style Tai Chi

Kung Fu Tea


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