Key details
Dr Caroline Rabourdin
Senior Lecturer in Architectural Histories & Theories
Caroline Rabourdin is an architect and Senior Lecturer in Architectural Theories & Histories. Her interdisciplinary research in the arts and humanities engages with art writing, poststructuralist theory, translation studies and critical heritage studies.
She is the author of Sense in Translation: Essays on the Bilingual Body (Routledge, 2020) and is currently working on a volume about the relevance of Hélène Cixous’s situated writing for the acclaimed Thinkers for Architects series.
Caroline joined the University of Greenwich in 2020, with teaching and coordinating responsibilities across the BA and M.Arch programmes. She is an active member of the Steering Committee of the Centre for Research in Language and Heritage (CREL) and member of the Centre for Spatial and Digital Ecologies. She is also Honorary Lecturer at the Bartlett, UCL, acting as PhD supervisor on the Architectural Design doctoral programme.
Trained as an architect at INSA Strasbourg (Dip.Arch), the University of Edinburgh (Erasmus), and the Bartlett School of Architecture (M.Arch with Distinction, on a British Council Entente Cordiale Scholarship), she practiced for a number of years in Paris and London (Shed 54 for the Wapping Project, Foster & Partners, Softroom for the V&A Museum, Noe Duchaufour-Lawrance) before engaging in research and academia.
She was awarded her PhD in 2016 by the University of the Arts London for her interdisciplinary art research on embodied translation, and has taught architectural design and theory at Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture in Paris, Chelsea College of Arts (UAL), the Bartlett (UCL) and the AA School of Architecture.
Responsibilities within the university
Teaching and Module co-ordination
ARCT1008 Contemporary Theories of Architecture, BA Architecture (level 5)
ARCT1064 Theories of Architecture, MArch Architecture (level 7)
ARCT1060 Architectural Thesis, MArch Architecture (level 7)
Academic Citizenship
Admissions Interviews
Academic Tutoring
Research affiliations
Steering Group Member of the Centre for Research in Language and Heritage (CREL)
Member of the Centre for Spatial and Digital Ecologies
Awards
GOLD Advance HE Fellow (2023)
UCL Student Choice Awards — Nominee for Inspiring Teaching Delivery (2018)
Distinction in Design and Theory, Masters in Architecture, Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL (2001)
Entente Cordiale Scholarship awarded by the British Council (2000)
Research / Scholarly interests
Caroline Rabourdin’s research interests include spatial theory, art writing, spatial literature, phenomenology, post-structuralist theory, translation studies and comparative literature.
A trained and experienced architect, her practice over the last decade has moved to art writing, with particular focus on the essay as a performative, creative and non-linear form of writing. As a bilingual writer, she is interested in the potential for translation, and comparative approaches to language to give rise to new ideas. She considers essay writing as a critical and creative practice and the space between languages as a productive space for new architectural ideas.
In her monograph Sense in Translation: Essays on the Bilingual Body (Routledge, 2020), she argues for an embodied understanding of translation whereby the analogy between linguistic translation and spatial translation is much more than a simple comparison. Informed by phenomenology and in particular Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s work on sens, this innovative and interdisciplinary collection of essays draws from philosophers and post-structuralist thinkers such as Jacques Derrida, Hélène Cixous, as well as writers such as Michel Butor, Louis Wolfson and Lisa Robertson. Ultimately, the essays tend towards the realisation that linguistic translation and spatial translation can no longer be categorised as distinct, but rather join in the capacity of our bodies to sense and in our desire to make sense.
Caroline has read at numerous international symposiums on modern languages, comparative literature and the arts, including the ACLA symposium at Harvard University and the Arts in Translation Biennale in Reykjavik and has published works in English and in French in architecture magazines and peer-reviewed journals and books.
She welcomes PhD applications related to the following areas of study:
- Literature and Architecture
- Translation, Multilingualism and Multiculturalism in Architecture
- Post-colonial Architecture
- Post-Structuralist Writing
- Art Writing
- Site Writing
Key funded projects
‘The essay as Forms of Rewriting’: interdisciplinary and experimental translation of Mireille Calle Gruber’s “L’essai comme forme de réécriture: Cixous à Montaigne” in collaboration with graphic designer Matthew Chrislip and translator Sophie Lewis. The project was supported by the Arts Council England DYCP award and is available at www.theessayasrewriting.net.
‘Convivial Spaces: Forms and Figures or Encounters in Writing and Architecture’: research workshop with Dr Katarina Stenke, supported by the Collaborative Research Fund, awarded by the Institute for Inclusive Communities and Environments.