Here is the western definition: various sports or skills, mainly of Japanese origin, that originated as forms of self-defense or attack, such as judo, karate, and kendo. here is an eastern definition: The Chinese character “mu” literally means “to stop fighting” or “to put down weapons.” The word “arts” in martial arts points to skill, expression of beauty or creativity. The combination “martial arts” may be interpreted to mean ending conflict skillfully. https://www.master-sh-yu.com/articles/what-is-the-true-meaning-of-martial-arts/ By those definitions Yes.
Yes, of course. It diluted into a more sport-friendly fashion, turning many boxers into more of a glass artillery when facing more balanced martial artists, but old-school boxers were extremely dangerous even in such environment: they knew wrestling, they had more bare knuckle oriented techniques, and were far more accustomed to dirty maneuvers and intentions. Heck, if you go back to Figgs times, boxing was an extremely efficient method of self-defense, though obviously it differed greatly from the Queensberry version.
Well , when I was a teenager and training for boxing, at least in Puerto Rico, boxing was not considered so. For example, boxeo and artes marciales had two separate column on the newspaper sports section. And the television sportscasters would say "and now, on to boxing news" and then they'd say "and in martial arts, xxx won a tournament" but always separate. And martial arts schools never offered boxing class, that was always at the dedicated boxing gym....that's' why I decided to make the poll. In fact, when I read on Wikipedia that boxing is a martial art, I was confused!
It depends on how you define martial art. Traditionally, martial arts are thought of as being combat systems of Chinese, Japanese or East Asian origin that were conceived for military training and warfare purposes. Under that definition, western boxing is not a martial art. However, according to wikipedia, the term martial arts originated in European culture and is a reference to the Roman god Mars, who is the god of war. We know that boxing was one of the original sports practiced in the ancient Olympic games, and it was a fixture in Roman culture as well. And apparently, boxing training was at least somewhat incorporated in Greco-Roman military training, especially in Spartan culture. So, according to that information, it would be considered a martial art and perhaps the oldest martial art in the world aside from Greco-Roman wrestling. Either way, it's a combat system that requires intense dedication and decades to develop and master its skills. In this way, it's no different than Judo, Karate, Muay Thai or any other martial art. Still, I don't think most boxers would consider it to be a martial art. There isn't much spiritual or cultural aspects that are attached to boxing training that you see in other martial arts like muay thai. Maybe someone like Manny Pacquaio or Naoya Inoue would disagree with that, though.
It is and can't be else. Even though we're used to call only the Eastern styles martial arts, but our own are the same. Boxing has its traditions, trainings, techniques. It's the type of fighting that best shows clash of styles. I'd say it's even more advanced in some ways (despite its own limitations, ones every martial art has) for the reason it gives you the best perspective of distancing, angles, footwork, combos, but in short: there's a reason it's called the sweet science.
Of course boxing is a martial art and one of the best ones. It has very active measuring of skills in a pressure environment and a pro boxer will have better conditioning than most of the guys in what are considered the traditional martial arts.
It has always been one, technically. In common parlance however "martial arts" was often used in Western culture, for decades, to refer to east Asian fighting disciplines. Since the advent of MMA (commensurate with the decline of highway McDojos and the demystification & public exposure of charlatan kung fu masters and other chi-based practitioners) that connotation has weakened. So really it would have never been correct to exclude boxing from a list of global martial arts, but less appropriate than ever now.
You have to start with the definition of a martial artist versus a fighter. The best champions in mma, boxing, judo whatever are both - and an athlete too. If you are someone who trains a combat sport for the purpose of improving your own skills - you could be described as a martial artist. If you only show up to train for an 8 week camp, have your fight then disappear after - you are a fighter. A more interesting questions for me is what is a fight versus a match. For example a judo or jiu jitsu contest often gets called a match. A boxing or mma contest often gets called a fight. Frankly I don’t think a boxing match is a fight. There are so many rules and restrictions on what you can do it is no more a fight than a taekwondo match. But for me an experienced boxer who is passionate about improving own skills is just as much of a martial artist as e.g. a judo black belt.
