11

It's a tough world and practice will always trump theory (save in the universities).

In practice we, in the world, must do business with each other. How will this global

economy evolve? Watch mixed martial arts, the true marketplace of ideas.30

In other words, MMA is the American sport par excellence, in that it knows no

boundaries, just like capitalism. A rather particular interpretation of interculturality taken almost

literally, though with a somewhat saccharine tone, by the ex-fighter and master of martial arts

Yuki Nakai, ex-fighter and martial arts master, who in fact lost an eye at the hands of Gordeau,

takes almost literally a rather particular interpretation of interculturality, though with a somewhat

saccharine tone:

I would like to make society better through martial arts. . . . , he says in an

interview at his gym just before class starts. In martial arts, you can overcome things

and communicate with others using only your body. There is no language barrier. So I

think its a useful tool for making friends from around the world. 31

In short, whether for the playwright interested in realism or for the stoic judoka and

jujitsu expert, the principal metaphor for MMA is exchange, that is, commerce. 32 This is true

to some degree, but what exactly is being exchanged? In every defensive description, in every

philosophical analysis of the martial arts (from Bruce Lee [2006] onward), the emphasis is

30
See D. Mamet, Ultimate Fighting: The Final Frontier, The Guardian, 30 September 30,
2007,. (http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2007/sep/30/features.sport.4) Accessed 23 Formatted: Default Paragraph Font, Font: (Default)
August, 2016. +Body (Calibri), Complex Script Font: +Body CS (Arial)
31
J. Williams, Yuki Nakai remains committed to teaching true spirit of martial arts, Japan
Today, 16 September, 2016.
32
Mamet is an author unafraid of contradicting himself. He wrote American Buffalo and
Glengarry Glen Ross, dramas which later became films about human greed, and then in 2008 he
directed Red Belt, in which an expert fighter and jujitsu trainer clashes with mentality of
professional martial arts, a mentality that Mamet praises in the aforementioned article. However
(in keeping with his passion for jujitsu), combat, deception, violence, entrapment, etc. are all
essential themes in his cinematic and theatrical work. See his interviews collected in Kane
(2001).