Conceptualising and negotiating"Home"in Youth Hostel:A case study of Desti Youth Hostel in Lijiang
Youth hostels are increasingly popular among young travelers in China's self-catering tourism mar-ket.This case study employs field research and in-depth interviews to analyze Desti Youth Hostel,construct-ing a four-quadrant conceptual model of hostel home spaces.This model is based on axes of idealistic orienta-tion vs.realistic orientation and material pursuits vs.social pursuits.Through thematic analysis,the research identifies various functions of youth hostels and the local negotiation strategies employed by young guests.Our findings indicate that youth hostels hold different meanings for young people depending on various identities,manifesting in four functional forms:Traditional home,social home,life home,and ideal home.In the interac-tion between young people and hostel spaces,each form has its limitations that necessitate specific coping strategies to achieve a balanced state.Firstly,for the traditional home function,limitations stem from weak loc-al connections due to brief tourist stays,prompting young people to deepen emotional ties with the hostel's home space by incorporating the spatial experiences of others.Secondly,for the social home function,the lim-itations arise from the social insecurity caused by the diverse community and high turnover of residents,requir-ing young people to be socially agile and adept at managing their interactions to navigate this environment ef-fectively.Thirdly,for the life home function,the semi-public nature of hostels fails to meet young people's need for privacy and a sense of ownership found in their original homes.Young people thus reconstruct their new daily lives around the characteristics of this new home.Fourthly,the ideal home function is compromised by commercialized cultural settings and the distorted cultural environment of the space,requiring young people to either adapt to the new cultural space of youth hostels or choose other Desti Youth Hostel branches to exper-ience a more ideal cultural environment.This study argues that the concept of home can be embedded within tourism mobility.The concept of home has gradually taken on new functions and meanings under the influ-ence of contemporary tourism.Although the home space within youth hostels differs from traditional forms of home,most respondents agreed that,both explicitly and metaphorically,they felt a sense of home through re-peated stays in youth hostels.This indicates that the concept of home in the context of tourism breaks away from the original home space in everyday life to forge new functionalities through constant interaction with mobility.This study enriches the understanding of the concept of home in tourism and reveals the significance of youth hostels for young people from the perspective of home space.
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