Parkour
Parkour (French: [paʁkuʁ]) is an athletic training discipline or sport in which practitioners (called traceurs) attempt to get from point A to point B in the fastest and most efficient way possible, without assisting equipment and often while performing feats of acrobatics.[5] With roots in military obstacle course training and martial arts, parkour includes flipping, running, climbing, swinging, vaulting, jumping, plyometrics, rolling, and quadrupedal movement—whatever is suitable for a given situation.[6][7] Parkour is an activity that can be practiced alone or with others, and is usually carried out in urban spaces, though it can be done anywhere.[8][9] It involves seeing one's environment in a new way, and envisioning the potential for navigating it by movement around, across, through, over and under its features.[10][11]
"Parcours" redirects here. For the term used in cycle racing, see Glossary of cycling § P.Also known as
Obstacle passing
France
1995–1996
Although a traceur may perform a flip as well as other aesthetic acrobatic movements, these are not essential to the discipline.[12] Rather, they are central to freerunning, a discipline derived from parkour but emphasising artistry rather than efficiency.
The practice of similar movements had existed in communities around the world for centuries,[13] notably in Africa[14] and China,[15] the latter tradition (qinggong) popularized by Hong Kong action cinema (notably Jackie Chan) during the 1970s to 1980s.[15][16][17] Parkour as a type of movement was later established by David Belle when he and others founded the Yamakasi in the 1990s and initially called it l'art du déplacement.[18][19] The discipline was popularised in the 1990s and 2000s through films, documentaries, video games, and advertisements.[13][20][21]
Etymology[edit]
The word parkour derives from parcours du combattant (obstacle course), the classic obstacle course method of military training proposed by Georges Hébert.[22][23][24] Raymond Belle used the term "les parcours" to encompass all of his training including climbing, jumping, running, balancing, and the other methods he undertook in his personal athletic advancement.[25] His son, David, further developed his father's methods and achieved success as a stuntman, and one day on a film set showed his 'Speed Air Man' video to Hubert Koundé. Koundé suggested he change the "c" of "parcours" to a "k" because it was stronger and more dynamic, and to remove the silent "s" for the same reason, forming "parkour".[26]
A practitioner of parkour is called a traceur, with the feminine form being traceuse or simply a "Parkourist".[6] They are nouns derived from the French verb tracer, which normally means "to trace", as in "tracing a path", in reference to drawing.[27] The verb tracer used familiarly means: "to hurry up".[28] The term traceur was originally the name of a parkour group headed by David Belle which included Sébastien Foucan and Stéphane Vigroux.[29]
A jam refers to a meeting of traceurs, involving training lasting anywhere from hours to several days, often with people from different cities. The first parkour jam was organised in July 2002 by Romain Drouet, with a dozen people including Sébastien Foucan and Stéphane Vigroux.
History[edit]
Origins[edit]
The practice of similar movements have existed in various communities around the world for centuries prior to the foundation of a parkour movement, which was influenced by these earlier traditions.[13][16][17] Such athletic traditions had existed among various indigenous peoples in Africa for centuries.[14] A similar discipline in Chinese culture is qinggong, a Chinese martial arts training technique that also dates back centuries. It was notably taught at the Peking Opera School in the 20th century; the school's most notable students are the Seven Little Fortunes, including Sammo Hung and most famously Jackie Chan, providing a basis for their acrobatic stunt work in Hong Kong action cinema from the 1970s onwards.[15][16][17]
Organizations[edit]
International parkour organizations include the World Freerunning and Parkour Federation, established in 2007, who have worked with MTV to produce parkour-related shows.[47]
Derivative terminologies and disciplines[edit]
In September 2003, Mike Christie's documentary Jump London, starring Sébastien Foucan, was released. In the documentary, the term "freerunning" was used as an attempt to translate "parkour", in order to make it more appealing to the English-speaking audience.[139] Foucan decided to keep using the term "freerunning" to describe his discipline, to distinguish it from David Belle's methods.[140][141]
The remaining seven Yamakasi members continued to use the term "l'art du déplacement", also not wanting to associate it too closely with parkour. Similar to Sébastien's freerunning, l'art du déplacement is less about the hard discipline of the original Yamakasi group; rather, it takes a participatory approach focused on making the teaching more accessible. David Belle kept the term "parkour", saying the group contributed to the development of it, but that his father was the source of his motivation and had verbally communicated this method only to him.[141]
Both parkour and freerunning encompass the ideas of overcoming obstacles and self-expression; in freerunning, the greater emphasis is on self-expression.[140] Although the differences between the disciplines are often hard to discern, practitioners tend to aspire to parkour and describe themselves as traceurs rather than as freerunners.[142]