THE INTERNATIONAL HOTEL AS A HETEROTOPIC SITE AND A NON-PLACE IN THE SAN FRANCISCO NOVEL I HOTEL BY KAREN TEI YAMASHITA
THE INTERNATIONAL HOTEL AS A HETEROTOPIC SITE AND A NON-PLACE IN THE SAN FRANCISCO NOVEL I HOTEL BY KAREN TEI YAMASHITA

Summary/Abstract: Michel Foucault notices that “heterotopias always presuppose a system ofopening and closing that both isolates and makes them penetrable, […] [they are] notfreely accessible like a public place,”(Foucault 26) but the “individual has to submitto certain rites” and their inhabitants feel “sheltered, […] hidden, and isolatedwithout being allowed out in the open.” (Foucault 26-27) Since hotels are erected inalmost every American city and they may also belong to the category of non-places(using Marc Auge’s terminology), the aim of the present article is to shed some lightupon the construction of the hotel as a heterotopic site and a non-place in the SanFrancisco-set novel I Hotel (2010) written by the Asian American writer Karen TeiYamashita. In this context, the present article also touches upon the question whetherthe adopted country should be perceived by the immigrants who are ‘on route toassimilation’ as a host country or as a hotel country.

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