Silat

Silat is a collective word for a class of indigenous martial arts from a geo-cultural area of Southeast Asia encompassing most of the Nusantara, the Indonesian Archipelago, the Malay Archipelago and the entirety of the Malay Peninsula. Originally developed in what are now Indonesia, peninsular Malaysia, south Thailand, and Singapore, it is also traditionally practiced in Brunei, Vietnam and the southern Philippines. There are hundreds of different styles (aliran) and schools (perguruan) but they tend to focus either on strikes, joint manipulation, throws, bladed weaponry, or some combination thereof. Silat is one of the sports included in the Southeast Asian Games and other region-wide competitions. Training halls are overseen by separate national organizations in each of the main countries the art is practiced. These are Ikatan Pencak Silat Indonesia (IPSI) from Indonesia, Persekutuan Silat Kebangsaan Malaysia (PESAKA) from Malaysia, Persekutuan Silat Brunei Darussalam (PERSIB) from Brunei and Persekutuan Silat Singapura (PERSISI) from Singapore. Practitioners are called pesilat.

Silat Melayu

Silat Melayu (Jawi: سيلت ملايو), literally meaning "Malay silat" is a blanket term for silat styles of the Malay people. The term was originally used in reference to the native silat of Riau, but today it is more commonly used for the systems created in peninsular Southeast Asia, particularly Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Brunei and Vietnam. In modern usage, the term is most often used to differentiate the Malaysian styles from Indonesian pencak silat. English-language writings sometimes mistakenly refer to silat Melayu as bersilat but this is actually a verb form of the noun silat.

Etymology

Silat (disambiguation)

Silat may refer to: