Traditional tae kwon do in chicago

[VICENTE]

Can anyone suggest a traditional Tae Kwon Do school in Chicago that teaches old-school practical fighting and not the water-down Mc Dojo crap too many of us see to often ? Any suggestions and advice is both welcome and appreciated. Gracias

[nirgle]

I think taekwondo has become synonymous with the watered-down crap you referred to and I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a school that has stuck true with the art's roots. I would go with a traditional karate school if I were looking for old-school taekwondo (good mixture of hands with legs etc).

[Abbax8]

Consider an Hapkido school, it may be more of what you are looking for.

Dennis

[TonyU]

Both valid and suggestions depending on what you want. Go karate if you want to go back towards the roots or Hapkido if you want stay with Korean influences.

[gmtkd]

I think taekwondo has become synonymous with the watered-down crap you referred to and I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a school that has stuck true with the art's roots. I would go with a traditional karate school if I were looking for old-school taekwondo (good mixture of hands with legs etc).

I see this issue a bit differently than nirgle does.

I would say that there was a time when Karate and Taekwondo (actually it was commonly spelled Tae Kwon Do then) were very similar.
But, since those days TKD has split into two distinct factions. (dozens of factions if you want to get picky)

One "faction" called tkd do what most martial artists call "traditional" stuff and teach something that is not so much different from Karate. Tkd and Karate started becoming what they are now while Japan had occupied Korea, so they were somewhat mixed up back then and still are in what I consider a "traditional" school.

Then, there's the rest of us Taekwondo people who follow the Kukkiwon and the WTF and have let taekwondo evolve into something quite different than what it was "traditionally." I know, some people don't like to see much sport with their martial arts. But, I think taekwondo's modern sporting aspects are one of it's best parts.

I hope some day to start a movement where all "traditional" schools spell it Tae Kwon Do and all modern spell it Taekwondo so the public can better guess what the school teaches. I really think traditional and modern tkd are different enough that they should not share the same name.

As for a "McDojo" I think those can be found here and there in either the Tae Kwon Do group or Taekwondo group as they can with any martial art where an instructor focuses so much on making money that they stop focusing on improving their students abilities.
Then there are