I will be mainly highlighting my eminence as an Asian Actor but as many of you know I greatly impacted martial arts as well, which I will cover. Being one of the first prominent Asian actors was hard. I’ve had to face and overcome many obstacles along the path towards my personal and global success, including poverty, racial prejudice, and many injuries. My impact has allowed others to not need to face as many challenges regarding those negative aspects of life. I showed the world that strength isn’t determined by the size of a man. Strength is determined by one's persistence, dedication, motivation, and fearlessness. Despite the challenges, I became one of the biggest pop culture icons of the Twentieth century, and I am often credited with changing the way Asians were presented in American films.
Now to talk about my eminence as a martial artist. I am renowned for my martial arts expertise and helped popularize martial arts movies in the 1970s. During my childhood and teenage years, I grew up in Hong Kong, where street fighting culture and youth gangs were prevalent. As a pupil of Yip Man, I studied Wing Chun, because of its relatively high level of application to real-life street fights. I always looked for practical martial arts that were results-oriented, simple, and to the point. This played a big role in my creation of Jeet Kune Do (the Way of the Intercepting Fist). Now Jeet Kune Do, a collection of various techniques and philosophies from different martial arts is recognized to be the first real form of mixed martial arts. Overall, as an Actor of Asian descent and martial artist, I have shaped how my culture is treated in the movie industry today. |