This article is written on the term “heteroptopia”, which is a product of the French thinker, social theorist, historian, literary critic, anthropologist, psychologist and sociologist, Michael Foucault. Heterotopia is the interpretation of Foucault by some of the space types that we can observe during our daily life, such as being on top of each other or side by side.
Heterotopia is proposed by Micheal Foucault as a concept opposing utopia; examining, analyzing, describing and reading places. In fact we cannot say that there is only one heterotopia in absolute terms. But there is much to be said about the concept of Foucault’s narrative about this concept.
We can think of Foucault’s heterotopia spaces as the Matrushka babies. In other words, we can say that places of heterotopia have found a place in a larger environment than the next, but also occupy a smaller space in the previous one. Foucault says exactly on this subject: “other areas find themselves in a larger environment. One exclusion area and a larger environment around this area.”
For a sailor, the ship is not heterotopia. Ship for him; a norm he lives in, the environment he is trying to build. But when a sailor sets foot on an island, he starts to live in a different place that he doesn’t know for. It sets new rules for the new living space and sets new limits. The island, which is another area for the seafarer, can be considered as heterotopia.
First, we can separate the holy or forbidden places into heterotopias. As an example, we can give places for honeymoons for young girls. The honeymoon hotel is nowhere near the location. Another example is that the first symptoms of male sexuality are thought to be somewhere other than family; The boarding schools or the military in the 19th century were nowhere to be. These places were called crisis heterotopias. Even though they were to disappear nowadays, they were categorizing according to the examinations carried out in their periods. Nowadays, there are resting houses, psychiatric clinics, prisons and retirement homes in this category. As a result, heterotopia has a clear and definite function for society. It can also gain or lose a function together with the synchronicity of its culture.
Foucault mezs heterotopia is an interesting place to consider the graveyard. Exclusion according to other places in the city, the function of changing according to belief is a heterotopia. Heterotopia commences as a result of time rupture and division; provides a place for heterotopia in the spatial evaluation of the cemetery. of Cemeteries; it is a heteropic situation when a person begins to live a new life in another world with the end of his life on earth.
In addition to the division and fragmentation of time, it is also related to the places of heterotopia; we can also add museums and libraries. The desire to accumulate all the times, periods, forms and pleasures in one place (the desire to create a place in which time cannot harm) was created with the idea of saving the momentary times from the temporality and making them infinite. Foucault has accepted museums and libraries as the place of heterotopia because of the idea of living an event that occurred in a certain time period in a different time period.
Regarding the temporality of time, if we look at the places of heterotopia; fairgrounds and festival areas. Nowadays, it is also possible to add holiday villages. With the same logic, they create a different sense of space with the 3D scenes they project on the screen.
Gardens are one of the oldest places of the philosophy of Heteropia. The gardens, which have a history of thousands of years, have a spiritual meaning in eastern civilizations. For example, traditional Acem gardens; the four corners of the world, which represent the four realms of the world, the center of the more holy world, representing the middle of the pool and water fountain is the garden. Nowadays zoos may be an example to this. Can we call a military barracks, a prison, or a place to enter certain missions? Heterotopias with one of their opposites; there is an aspect that hides exclusions, as opposed to requiring an opening and closing system.