Culture makes U.S. communities great!

International Night at McCleskey Middle School

Opinion: At the same time I have been reading Alain Locke’s "Race Contacts and Interracial Relations", our WingChun Kung fu School, Atlanta WingChun (http://www.iaw-atlanta.com), was invited to give a demonstration at Cobb County’s McCleskey Middle School for the PTA’s International Night.

Locke removed race from its biological basis and put it on a cultural foundation. The idea that we should harness and promote our many cultural strengths as a nation will lead us to truly make our communities better, for in “America”, all cultures are important; none should be placed in a vacuum, and none should be deemed supreme.

Martial arts training can be enjoyed by all.

At the event, a student of Chinese descent asked me what country I was representing. When I said China, she looked at me a little puzzled. “Do you speak Chinese?” she asked. “No, but my family teaches a martial arts style from China,” I told her.

Yes, African Americans do practice and teach kung fu! In our classes, we teach all races and sexes from different countries -  Mexico, England, Columbia, Ethiopia, etc. Kung fu is an art that can be enjoyed by all, and our Grandmaster is German!

When one of our highest leaders proclaimed that “We speak English here,” he made a lying mockery of our cultural strengths. Doesn’t his wife speak four or five languages? Aren’t polyglots some of the most advanced people in the universe which could mean the more languages you speak, the more folks you can relate to?

Expand your mind, and never limit your learning.