Robin Bachin

Ph.D., University of Michigan (1996);
Charlton W. Tebeau Associate Professor

e-mail: rbachin@miami.edu
Office: Rm. 606 Ashe
Phone: (305) 284-4261

    Robin F. Bachin is the Charlton W. Tebeau Associate Professor of History and Director of the American Studies Program at the University of Miami. She also currently serves at the Director of the Civic Engagement Project at UM. She received her B.A. from Brandeis University and her M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Michigan. Her areas of research and teaching include American urban, environmental, immigration, sport, and cultural history.   Her first book, Building the South Side: Urban Space and Civic Culture in Chicago, 1890-1919, was published by the University of Chicago Press in 2004 and won the Award for Outstanding Contribution to Illinois History and Heritage. Bachin’s current book projects include Home Away from Home: The Transformation of Seaside Recreation on the East Coast, 1865-2000, and Tropical Urbanism: Modernity, Exoticism, and the Creation of South Florida.

Bachin was awarded the John Reps Prize for distinguished dissertation in urban planning history; the Provost’s Award for Excellence in Teaching, and the College of Arts and Sciences Award for Scholarly Excellence. In addition, she has received fellowships from the Graham Foundation for the Advancement of the Fine Arts, the Andrew Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Driehaus Foundation. She also was awarded a University of Miami Library Fellowship to create a digital archive on “Travel, Tourism, and Urban Growth in Greater Miami” (http://scholar.library.miami.edu/miamidigital). Bachin served as guest curator of an exhibition at the Wolfsonian Museum in Miami Beach entitled "In Pursuit of Pleasure: Schultze and Weaver and the American Hotel," which ran from November 2005 through May 2006. Princeton Architectural Press published the exhibition catalogue, Grand Hotels of the Jazz Age. She also was a senior consulting editor on The American Midwest: An Interpretive Encyclopedia (Indiana University Press, 2007).

Bachin is the current president of the Society for American City and Regional Planning History (SACRPH), a national organization dedicated to promoting research and education on the history of cities and metropolitan regions, and bridging the gap between the scholarly study of cities and the practice of urban planning. She also has served on the Boards of Directors of the Urban History Association, the Miami Consortium for Urban Studies, and the Urban Environment League of Greater Miami. Prior to joining the faculty at the University of Miami, she was the Assistant Director of the Scholl Center for Family and Community History at the Newberry Library in Chicago, where she served as Project Coordinator for the National Park Service's Labor History Landmark Project. Bachin has appeared on The Today Show, National Public Radio, and NBC television discussing topics ranging from the impact of public parks on urban life to the changing role of women in intercollegiate athletics.