How do we understand what happens when bodies routinely cross borders, when they are subjected to all forms of scrutiny? In what ways are processes of subjection performed, like nationality but also gender, sexuality, and race allowing agents of the state to determine the status of belonging, rights, and humanity? In narrating a personal journey through and within checkpoints in the West Bank, Mabel O. Wilson considers the violence of architecture: how borders divide territory and function as wastelands, zones of suspended time, and disrupted space.

“On the Violence of Architecture” with Mabel O. Wilson is presented as part of e-flux Architecture Lectures, a monthly series inviting researchers and practitioners to discuss timely issues in contemporary architecture, theory, culture, and technology.

About the Speakers

Mabel O. Wilson is the Nancy and George E Rupp Professor of Architecture, Planning and Preservation and a Professor in African American and African Diaspora Studies at Columbia University.

Mahdi Sabbagh is a writer, architect, and urbanist. He is co-curator of the Palestine Festival of Literature and Editor at large at the Avery Review.

For more information about Mabel O. Wilson’s lecture, “On the Violence of Architecture,” contact program@e-flux.com.