Monday, March 30, 2009

TAEKWONDO SELFDEFENCE


Taekwondo (Korean pronunciation: [tʰɛ.kwʌn.do]) is a Korean martial art and the national sport of South Korea. It is the world's most popular martial art in terms of the number of practitioners.[1] Gyeorugi (Korean pronunciation: [gjʌ.rʊ.ɡi]), a type of sparring, has been an Olympic event since 2000.
In Korean, tae (Hangul: 태, hanja: ) means "to strike or break with foot"; kwon (Hangul: 권, hanja: ) means "to strike or break with fist"; and do (Hangul: 도, hanja: ) means "way" or "method"; so "taekwondo" is loosely translated as "the way of the foot and fist" or "the way of kicking and punching".
Taekwondo's popularity has resulted in the varied development of the martial art into several domains: as with many other arts, it combines combat techniques, self-defense, sport, exercise, meditation and philosophy. Taekwondo is also used by the South Korean military as part of its training.[2]
Formally, there are two main styles of taekwondo. One comes from the Kukkiwon, the source of the sparring system sihap gyeorugi which is now an event at the summer Olympic Games and which is governed by the World Taekwondo Federation (WTF). The other comes from the International Taekwondo Federation (ITF). There is also a more recent form called Songham Taekwondo or the American Taekwondo Association (ATA) and other variations of it such as STF (Songham Taekwondo Federation) and WTTU (World Traditional Taekwondo Union).[3]

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