Over the past couple of week in my Digital Citizen’s class, we have been doing research and using Twitter, a social media website, find out information about a topic we have a passion in or found an interest in. For this project, I decided to focus on Parkour. I landed on this topic because I have a background in gymnastics and have watched shows like “ American Ninja Warriors” and admired how they effortlessly glided the air. So, I wanted to learn some background knowledge behind the sport, like how did it develop into the Parkour we know today and what it takes to do the flips and tricks many of the action stars do in movies. With that motivation in mind, I began my search for the world of Parkour.

Now, to begin with this research project was different from many other project I have done before with the added aspect of using social media. In this case, we used the popular platform of Twitter which only allows 140 characters for you to express what’s on your mind. Surprisingly, this became quite difficult later on in the process. My class’s first assignment was to follow at least ten people who were in our field of study or had some type connection with our topic. Below our my list of people I began to follow.

 

Jereme Sanders @jeremesanders – Parkour enthusiast (hobby)   

Andy Pearson @lonetraceur – Senior Coach of Parkour and Branding Designer for Parkour Generations

Parkour Generations@PKGenerations –  Professional Parkour/ freerunning company

Dan Edwardes @DanEdwardes –  Founder of Parkour Generations

Michigan Parkour @MichiganParkour – Parkour Club based in Michigan, USA

Blane @ChrisRowat – Manager and Senior Coach at Parkour Generations

Shirley Darlington @Shirtrix – Parkour Enthusiast and Coach

USAP College @USAPcollege – Parkour Club/ Company

Melanie Hunt @flipMelanie – Parkour/ Freerunner enthusiast

Carl Fantauzzo @BigC_ANW – American Ninja Warrior Contestant

 

After a couple of weeks of engaging in these people’s feed by liking, retweeting, and tweeting out to them, it started to develop a online relationship. Therefore, after that was established it was time to ask questions that would further my understanding of parkour. As stated early, the part was a bit difficult because Twitter only always a maximum of 140 characters, so our questions had to thought out. In total, ten questions were asked all dealing with how parkour affects their life in someway, the public view of the sport, or how to start out if you’re just a beginner. Here are the full length questions.

 

1. How do you suggest beginners get on the parkour scene?
2. What’s your opinion on how females are viewed in sport?
3. What impact do you think parkour has on mainstream media?
4. Why do you think are usually seen as the underdog in athletic situations? \
5. What motivates you to stay active?
6. In what way does Parkour bring people together?
7. What’s the most important life lesson you’ve learned from Parkour? Also, do you have any good source on parkour’s history?
8. What’s one thing you want the general public to know about Parkour?
9. In what way has Parkour affected your life?
10. In what way do you think Parkour has changed over the years?

Asking these question, would help me have a understanding of what Parkour means to people who do it in their daily lives. If you really want to understand someone, you asks them directly.

Now the responds were not as active as I hoped but the one I received was helpful. Jermeme Sanders in reply to my tweet, in what way do you think parkour has changed over the years, he said “many ways. More exposure, more diffusion in its meaning due to the nature of the expansion of the parkour. More economic opportunity.” In response I said, “ Thank you for the response! I also think that Parkour will continue to expand and change over the years,” and the conversation ended there. Though, he was the only one to respond with the help of other resources and looking at the feed of the other users I was able to gain a deep knowledge of how this sport has blossomed into what we know today.

The weeks have been a research unlike any project I have had due to added element of social media. I gained one new follow through this project from Parkour Generation. In the future I will use the process to get more info from people who are the field I am study, which is what is great about using not just Twitter but any other social media source you are able to go right to the source. The academic connection is certain new age method that will catch on the surge of technology.