Yes, of course! The key is just be consistent and go to class. And like they say, anything is better than nothing! But inside of a year you should be formidable.

Get some mace and learn how to use that. A female cannot win against an aggressive male, especially when you are that small. Fighting an attacker is only going to piss them off and probably make them hurt you more. Mace used properly is an instant takedown anyone can use.

well, listen to my story.

I was 20 when I was in military service (obligatory for serbia) and I found out that near my military base, lives the ONLY Shaolin monk that reached highest level (12th robe, golden robe) that is not Chinese. It is even forbidden, but Shaolin leader monk gave him that option, to learn all the secrets.

I befriended him, and he taught me a lot, and gave me translated scripts from the Long technique (oldest shaolin technique there is)

I have not just learned how to fight, but also learned how NOT to fight, which is the best lesson I ever learned. Before, I would just use brute force to face a rude guy, cause that happens a lot here in Eastern Europe. But not anymore - there is no need to get in the fight, almost never. Only once have I fought when several douchebags attacked my friend by mistake and I found myself extremely calm, which was not the case before. dripping blood from the forehead, pulse at 30% (60% is the normal pulse after a high physical effort + adrenaline )

You are skinny, and my best advice to you is this:

1. Start correcting your nutritions. get some high protein foods, before starting martial arts and physical training. You must eat well in order for your body to accept those proteins and tun them into muscle (normal healthy muscle, not buffing yourself like those commercials)

2. You are, no matter what people say - ideal height for a real lady + possibility to inflict a potential mugger some serious damage. for comparison: Jelena Jankovic (serbian tennis player) is your height with 135 lbs. http://tennisinfoblog.com/wp-content/upl...

3. Once you adopt some sort of physical training, best way for you to learn martial arts is to use a defensive skills. Japanese culture has answer to that -

Aikido: with little force, you would learn not to punch your opponent, rather to disable him in various different ways. Women that I know that practice Aikido can bring down much bigger fellow than they are.

Tae-Kwan-Do: Being your height, your legs could do some serious damage. please, watch videos from London Olympics 2012 to see what Taekwando is all about. Or ask a friend to show you Hwoarang from Tekken games :) It is also a defensive style, that would enable you to kick the shi* out of a guy that is approaching you.

MMA is not the way to go. Even though media created MMA in the image of "ultimate" fight, believe me that it is not. It is a brutal cage fight made for the masses which they like. The reality is that in a street fight, a regular trained boxer would drop almost all of those men in MMA. Street fight takes seconds, there are no gloves, and rarely anyone gets tangled on the floor. For the best reference, watch a Turkish boxer fight off 3 guys that threatened him after a traffic accident: