Happy Valley heterotopia: representing colonial order in a Hong Kong “other space”

Abstract

Purpose This paper aims to trace the development of Hong Kong's Happy Valley from a space associated with dangerous miasmas to the site of a racecourse, recreation ground and a series of cemeteries for the colony's foreign communities while examining the relationship between the exclusion of Chinese from Happy Valley and the notion of colonial order. Design/methodology/approach This paper makes use of empirical evidence from historical documents, such as newspapers and government records, and applies Michel Foucault's notion of the heterotopia as a theoretical model. Findings This paper provides insights into the relationship between space and power in the colonial setting. It demonstrates that the imposition of colonial order in Happy Valley was a process that involved the exclusion of Chinese and that the various ways in which this order was reinforced, contested and negotiated revealed it to be shallow and incomplete. Originality/value This paper sheds light on an underexamined but important colonial space in 19th and early 20th century Hong Kong and complicates the notion of colonial control.