- Description
- 1 online resource (xi, 197 pages)
- Summary
- "Parkour is an emerging sport in which practitioners train themselves to move through urban environments in creative and often risky ways. Comprised of a pastiche of stylized movements and dependent on YouTube videos, parkour is quintessentially postmodern, and this book studies parkour from within its sociological context. The book traces the sport's development in Europe, parkour's growth into a worldwide phenomenon, and the meanings local Chicago practitioners have given to the sport. The book explores the dialectical relationship between practitioners' real world activities and global flows of information. It analyzes the city as a site for urban adventure seeking and situates these practices within a discussion of young men's masculine identity claims. Finally, the risk-taking commonly seen in parkour is connected to practitioners' symbolic practices that downplay the dangers of the sport while emphasizing their safety precautions. Instead of pushing the edges of survival, these young people insist they have trained themselves to be highly attuned risk assessors--individuals capable of successfully overcoming challenges of any sort. If urbanism is about the lives individuals lead in the city, parkour represents a unique postmodern interpretation of that way of life"--
- Series Statement
- Critical issues in sport and society
- Uniform Title
- Parkour and the city (Online)
- Alternative Title
- Parkour and the city (Online)
- Subject
- Bibliography (note)
- Includes bibliographical references and index.
- Access (note)
- Access restricted to authorized users.
- Contents
- Machine generated contents note: Acknowledgments -- Introduction: Thinking Sociologically about Parkour 1 Developing the Discipline and Creating a Sport 2 New Prisms of the Possible 3 Young Men in the City 4 Hedging Their Bets Conclusions: Appropriating the City -- Appendix A: Brief Note on Data and Method Appendix B: On the Parkour Terminology Used in This Book Notes BibliographyIndex.
- LCCN
- 2016025797
- OCLC
- ssj0001769919
- Author
Kidder, Jeffrey L. (Jeffrey Lowell), 1977-
- Title
Parkour and the city [electronic resource] : risk, masculinity, and meaning in a postmodern sport / Jeffrey L. Kidder.
- Imprint
New Brunswick, New Jersey : Rutgers University Press, [2017]
- Series
Critical issues in sport and society
- Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references and index.
- Access
Access restricted to authorized users.
- Connect to: