The courtroom as a built environment : on the usefulness of Amos Rapoport’s theoretical framework

Amos Rapoport is one of the pioneers of the studies on the relationship between people and their environments. At the same time, analyzing the built environment as a factor co-determining human interactions in the courtroom tends to be more and more popular in literature. Following this line, the paper aims to consider whether Rapoport’s theoretical framework (especially its part related to non-verbal communication through the environment) could be fruitfully applied to the study of the courtroom in order to shed some light on the spatial, physical, or architectural aspects of the courtroom (which is treated as a particular environment). This paper offers a preliminary examination of the usefulness of Rapoport’s framework in reference to the courtroom interior. What needs to be stressed is that, rather than focusing on a given jurisdiction as a point of reference when elaborating on the usefulness of Rapoport’s framework, the authors try to examine its general applicability.