헤테로토피아, 유토피아와 우토푸스 사이 －푸코 ‘헤테로토피아’의 유토피아적 함축에 관하여

Abstract

Foucault's ‘hétérotopie’ is usually discussed in connection with ‘utopia’. This is, above all, because Foucault himself introduces ‘utopia’ into the definition of the concept ‘hétérotopie’, and also because of the historical situation in which the utopian hopes and interests are bound to continue. For these reasons, Foucault's ‘hétérotopie’ is often used under a utopian perspective that implies the denial and resistance to reality, and the possibility of criticism and alternatives. However, Foucault did not provide a dictionary definition for this concept, but only showed various examples. Taking these examples as clues and reconstructing its meaning, we can see that such a utopian vision is not impossible, but unexpectedly, a meaning contrary to that vision is also implied. This is because the cases of hétérotopie have the moments of denial and criticism, and, at the same time, are the places where the oppression and the controlling are carried out. Foucault's hétérotopie is just a 'place' where the resistance, the oppression, and the other elements cross intricately, and not a concept that makes only the possibility of emancipation optimistic in a new way. Furthermore, Foucault opens up the possibility that hétérotopie can exist anytime, anywhere, and that new forms of it can occur suddenly. Noteworthy is that hétérotopie has a characteristic dependent on the subject who creates or leads this place. This indicates that there is no place that completely guarantees freedom, and that the emancipatory conversion of these places depends on the subject(utopus). Through this, the spatial discourse called ‘heterotopia’ is transformed into the discourse about the subject(-tification). The utopian imagination that identified the subject(-ification) and the space created by him touches the heterotopia at this point.