The meaning assigned to architecture is complex and varied. Urban architecture is often stripped of meaning when people abandon the neighborhoods or are absent of meaning at the time of their inception. This leaves the people who inhabit the terrain to assign their own meaning to the architecture. Jeffrey Kidder, the author of Parkour and the City: Risk, Masculinity, and Meaning in a Postmodern Sport (Rutgers University Press, 2017) and my guest for this episode, observed the way traceurs in Chicago, Illinois use urban architecture to express masculinity and risk-taking in their performance of parkour. In our interview, we discuss how this study was shaped from his past observations of message carriers, as well as topics such as the impact that history has on the development of parkour in nations around the world, the perception that traceurs have on hyper-masculine males who are viewed as dangerous when performing parkour, and the difference between risk-taking behavior and thrill-seeking behavior. We also learn about his thoughts on the current environment of risk-taking in lifestyle sports and how these sports are different from competitive (or team) sports.

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