Sunday, 1 May 2022

A Positive Review of Fighting without Fighting

Library Journal has published a pre-publication review of my forthcoming book, Fighting without Fighting: Kung Fu Cinema's Journey to the West.

https://www.libraryjournal.com/review/fighting-without-fighting-kung-fu-cinemas-journey-to-the-west-1788797

According to its author, Terry Bosky, "White’s scholarly take on Hollywood’s infatuation with kung fu offers multiple entry points for readers, from film historians to sociologists. Action film fans will come away with a deeper appreciation of these films, and an expanded watch list."

Sunday, 27 March 2022

Appearance on BBC Radio 3's Free Thinking


Bruce Lee strikes a pose in Enter the Dragon (1973)

I've just recently taken part in a discussion of the impact and legacy of Bruce Lee and Enter The Dragon, to be broadcast as part of BBC Radio 3's arts/culture magazine programme Free Thinking on 29th March 2022. The discussion was hosted by Matthew Sweet, and the other guests were:

  • Matthew Polly (who has written the authoritative biography of Bruce Lee)
  • William Sin (who has produced some fascinating work re-exploring classic questions of ethics in Western philosophy through Chinese thought, including the philosophy of action we have in Bruce Lee films)
  • Xine Yao (whose podcast 'PhDivas', about 'academia, culture and social justice', has also included a brilliant episode on Berry Gordy's Motown–kungfu mash-up The Last Dragon (1985))
During the programme, we discussed Lee's life and work, the impact of his films in American culture, the change in portrayals of Asian people within this, and the take-up of kung fu in Blaxploitation films and rap music, alongside questions of Lee's charisma and performance style, the ethical perspectives he offers on action, and his place in today's Hong Kong culture and identity.

Aside from that, I think that only other thing that I can say is that nunchaku were involved in the recording of this programme...

If you miss the programme, it will be available on BBC's iPlayer, and also through their 'Arts & Ideas' podcast. 

For more information, please see their website here:



Sunday, 27 February 2022

Fighting without Fighting: Kung Fu Cinema's Journey to the West

My forthcoming book, Fighting without Fighting: Kung Fu Cinema's Journey to the West (London: Reaktion, 2022), is due to be published in June, and is already available on pre-order.



It looks at the history and legacy of the "kung fu craze" which swept America, Europe, and the broader world, in 1973–4. It lays out the background of the craze in Hong Kong's long history of martial arts cinema, and in the growing awareness of martial arts amidst changing ideas of China (and "The East") in Western culture in the 1960s and 1970s. I trace the unfolding of the craze and discuss some of its most important films, and explore the ongoing significance of the kung fu phenomenon. In particular, I explore the ways that the arrival of Bruce Lee and kung fu was bound up in changing (and challenging) traditional identities, both as gendered and raced, during this tumultuous period. A final chapter considers the return of martial arts in twenty-first century wuxia films, such as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000), Hero (2002) and The Grandmaster (2013). Throughout, I explore not just film history, but martial arts within a wider popular culture from rap music to kids' cartoons.

See the publisher's page here.

Or Amazon here.

It's got some very generous recommendations!:

‘Fans and scholars alike will relish Luke White's remarkable exploration of kung fu cinema's explosive rise in the "West" and its ongoing influence in international culture. Fighting without Fighting is the definitive book on the subject.’ — Matthew Polly, bestselling author of American Shaolin, Tapped Out, and Bruce Lee: A Life

‘A comprehensive and exhilarating journey through the cultural history of “kung-fu fever”, showing how the Asian martial arts have permeated everything from Blaxploitation cinema and Hanna-Barbera cartoons to seventies disco tunes and Marvel comic books. White’s electric prose crackles with all the brio and rigour of a classic kung-fu throwdown.’ —Gary Bettinson, editor-in-chief of Asian Cinema and author of The Sensuous Cinema of Wong Kar-wai

‘This engagingly written book will be of great value for the scholars of kung fu cinema and martial arts aficionados seeking to expand their horizons about the development of the genre in the past five decades. White’s insightful and nuanced analysis not only helps us re-examine the enduring impact of the kung fu craze in the 1970s, but also rethink the key role that the genre plays in transnationalising cinema in the era of globalisation. With its inviting style, this work will enhance both film and martial arts studies collections.’ — Wayne K. T. Wong, School of East Asian Studies, University of Sheffield

‘In Fighting without Fighting, Luke White explores the origins of the 1970s "Kung Fu craze" in Chinese culture, the resonances of "Eastern" and oppressed heroes and heroines, and the ways in which their spectacular bodies were dramatised in innovative cinematography. He describes their impact on feminism, Black American cultures, music, videogames and renegotiations of masculinity, showing how an opening up to aspects of the "Oriental" revised and enriched mid-twentieth-century sensibilities, and how revisiting them enlightens contemporary debates on decolonisation. He traces influences and echoes in contemporary world cinema and speculative fictions, where the magical and mystical meet with politics of race, gender and empowerment. This amounts to an expert and ambitious narrative that spirals outwards from the advent of Kung Fu in ’70s Hong Kong and Hollywood to encompass a wide historical, geographic and ideological scope in which Bruce Lee is a persistent presence, and has the last word.’ — Barry Curtis, Professor at the University of the Arts, London, and author of Dark Places: The Haunted House in Film

Forthcoming essay: "Crippled Warriors: Masculinities and Martial Arts Media in Asia"

I have an essay coming out in a fascinating collection to be published this May (2022) by Routledge. The book is edited by Youna Kim and is titled Media in Asia: Global, Digital, Gendered and Mobile.




My own contribution, "Crippled Warriors: Masculinities and Martial Arts Media in Asia," traces the recurrent image of the disabled, sick and mutilated martial artist's body across Asian martial arts media, but especially, of course, in Hong Kong cinema, as a means to explore changing experiences of masculinity in Asian culture. Amongst the films I discuss are the Zatoichi series, One-Armed Swordsman (1967), and the 2018 Indian action comedy Mard Ko Dard Nahi Hota  / The Man Who Feels No Pain.

You can find out more about the book on Routledge's website here: https://www.routledge.com/Media-in-Asia-Global-Digital-Gendered-and-Mobile/Kim/p/book/9780367672850

And it's also available to pre-order on Amazon.

Still from The Man Who Feels No Pain, 2018.