Cheer leaders is an art and a physical activity which involves tumbling, dance, jumps, cheers, and stunting to direct spectators of events to cheer on sports teams at games or to participate in competitions.

Cheer leading was earlier don by the gents and was introduced by Princeton graduate Thomas Peebles to set up organized crowds cheering at football games to the University of Minnesota. But formally in 1898 another student Johnny Campbell directed a crowd in cheering and making him the very first cheerleader and November 2, 1898 the official birth date of organized cheerleading.

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However till the World War II it was a male dominated sport, but later in 1923, women joined cheerleading and began to dominate the sport as fewer men were involved in organized sports. The growing presentation of cheerleading as a sport to a global audience has been led by the 1997 start of broadcasts of cheerleading competition by ESPN International and the worldwide release of the 2000 film Bring it On. Today, estimates show that 97% of cheerleading participants overall are female

Cheer leading is now associated to most sports event and becomes an attraction to the fans. The ICC Twenty20 Cricket World Cup in South Africa in 2007 was the first international cricket event to have cheerleaders.

The IPL, in 2008,   had brought Cheer Leading to India, where the cultural restrictions are very high.  Instantly there was a stiff resistance from the saffron party BJP who admonished the exposing dress culture and advocated that it is not required for our culture. The second version of IPL in 2009 had to be conducted at South Africa and the Cheer leading sport flourished very well. But again in 2010 the controversy sprung up with the returning of the game to India. But whatever be the reasons the leaders are allowed to perform with more dress on them.

The traditional culture does not object costumes of the filmy folks, but cheer leaders are scar according to a few. On one hand, we have people who feel that the scantily-clad cheerleaders, cheering whenever their team players hit a boundary/sixer or get a wicket, make the game more entertaining. On the other, a section of society feels that these women, dressed to the bare minimum, degrade the spirit of the game and can also make the players lose their concentration. Whatever be the reaction, we can say only one thing, the IPL cheerleaders are here to stay!

In addition to cheering at games and competing, professional cheerleaders also, as teams, do a lot of philanthropy and charity work, modeling, motivational speaking, television performances, and advertising. There are Humanities colleges which offer courses on Cheer leading, across the globe.