Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2005. / Supervisors: Laura Lein and Henry Selby. Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Delaware, 2007. / Principal faculty advisor: Karen A. Curtis, School of Urban Affairs & Public Policy. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.A.)--West Virginia University, 2007. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains v, 62 p. : ill. (some col.). Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 59-62).

This study examined the perceptions of housing transitions of individuals with histories of residential instability. Participants were recruited from the Health and Housing in Transition study (HHiT), a longitudinal multi-city Canadian study tracking the health and housing of 1,192 participants over a 5-year period. Twenty-two participants from Ottawa were recruited from the larger study to participate in the present study. Participants were interviewed using a semi-structured interview guide about their experiences of housing transitions (moves from one housing situation to another). A general inductive method for the analysis of qualitative data was used to examine participants’ perceptions of their transitions. Findings suggest that participants experienced feelings of disconnection from their housing situations. Their transitions were characterized as chaotic and initiated by factors outside of their control. Participants attributed their transitions to factors such as interpersonal issues, substance use, financial issues, safety concerns, and pests. The present study emphasizes the complexity of participants’ precarious housing situations and the multifactorial nature of their residential instability.

Housing First is a housing model aimed at solving chronic homelessness. It works by offering housing to unhoused people without requiring them to get certain treatments, which reverses previous models. In this ethnographic study, I investigated how this program operates on the ground level, by interviewing and shadowing several case managers who work with clients who experience homelessness, addiction, and mental illnesses. What my research reveals are the tensions that emerge in the process of implementing Housing First programs. I explore how case managers shape the client’s choices and their relationships, to see how some forms of autonomy are valued over others and how clients are made to be individuals in some ways and a part of a community in others. Additionally, I show how case managers navigate ethical practice when the needs of the client conflict with the needs of the organizations for which the case manager works. This intervention is thought to be a solution to a widespread social problem. However, in practice, it is a market-based solution that can only work on an individual level. This results in the reinforcement of liberal understandings of autonomy and responsibility that contributed to the creation of homelessness as a social problem in the first place.

Abstract: Mothers and children are an increasingly significant segment of the population in Canada experiencing homelessness. Yet, there is a paucity of literature that focuses on the lived experience of mothers while caring for children within the social constructs of a shelter. It is therefore important to explore the subjective experience of women, and how they conceptualize the meaning of their experiences. The purpose of this study was twofold: To broaden our understanding of mothers' daily reality of caring for their children in the shelter environment, and to highlight the way discourses engender Othering processes. The project was supported by the theoretical frameworks of Michel Foucault and feminists Chris Weedon, and Mary Canales. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 30 mothers living with their children in four diverse shelter settings in a large urban centre in Canada. The interviews were conducted in English, French and with a cultural interpreter. Heidegger's interpretive phenomenology was used to analyze the data. Major findings suggest mothers experience a disruption in their capacity to care for their children on several levels: mothers are stigmatized and positioned as Other through exclusionary shelter practices; mothers are subjugated to paternalistic shelter rules that exert an emotional labour resulting from inconsistencies in shelter policies and practices; and mothers are burdened by the pervasive ongoing experience of violence. Results of this study suggest that in order to design services that effectively support optimal health and social outcomes for mothers and their children, it is important for public health providers, service providers and policy makers to be informed of the meaning of "being a mother in a shelter". -- Résumé: Les mères et les enfants représentent un segment de plus en plus important de la population canadienne vivant en situation d'itinérance. Pourtant, peu d’écrits se concentrent sur l'expérience vécue des mères qui s'occupent de leurs enfants dans le contexte social d'un refuge. Il est donc important d'explorer l'expérience subjective des femmes et la manière dont elles conceptualisent le sens de leurs expériences. L'objectif de cette étude est double : élargir notre compréhension de la réalité quotidienne des mères qui s'occupent de leurs enfants dans l'environnement d'un refuge, et mettre en évidence la manière dont les discours engendrent des processus d'altérité. Le projet était basé sur les cadres théoriques de Michel Foucault et des féministes Chris Weedon et Mary Canales. Des entrevues semi-structurées ont été menées auprès de 30 mères vivant avec leurs enfants dans quatre refuges d'un grand centre urbain au Canada. Les entrevues ont été menées en anglais, en français et avec un interprète culturel. La phénoménologie interprétative de Heidegger a été utilisée pour interpréter les données. Les principaux résultats suggèrent que les mères connaissent une perturbation dans leur capacité à prendre soin de leurs enfants à plusieurs niveaux; que les mères sont stigmatisées et positionnées comme « autres » par le biais de pratiques d'exclusion dans les refuges; que les mères sont domestiquées par les règles paternalistes du refuge qui exercent un labeur émotionnel résultant d'incohérences dans les politiques et les pratiques; et qu'elles font l'expérience omniprésente et continue de la violence. Les résultats de cette étude suggèrent que pour concevoir des services qui soutiennent efficacement les mères et leurs enfants sur les plans social et de la santé, il est important que les prestataires de santé publique, les prestataires de services et les décideurs politiques soient informés de ce que veut dire « être une mère dans un refuge ».

Amidst the changing social and economic landscape of the city due to the Covid-19 global pandemic, Hamilton has seen a spike in the visible homeless population and the increasing presence of tent cities occupying public space, sparking controversy within the local community. Media portrayals of the tent occupancies have focused on homelessness through the use of deviance frames, focusing on crime, violence and danger, as well as negative personality traits that include weak moral laxity, overall laziness, and willful dependence on the state. This is to delegitimize the plight of this group, in favour of the City’s approach to criminalize, displace, disband and exclude. The media discourse negates the growing body of evidence that homelessness is a by-product of economic, political and global shifts towards neo-liberal restructuring. The study seeks to understand how and why the individual-blaming narrative maintains its dominance, to become accepted as truth and reproduced by the general public in the public sphere; particularly as it relates to public understandings of the causes of homelessness and who is responsible. This study finds that the dominant discourse is led by neoliberal ideology which underpins and permeates all facets of society. The study’s findings are threefold. 1. The elites who support a neo-liberal agenda have been effective in managing the opinions of the general public to accept their framing of the problem and also the solutions. This means that the general public continues to uphold a neo-liberal agenda even when it is against their best interests. 2. The discourse is maintained through deliberate and strategic positioning of one group against another. 3. Given continued public support neoliberalism will continue to dominate the future of economic, political and social policy, that impacts the welfare of the members of this community including the community’s most vulnerable homeless population. With that in mind, social work must navigate these tensions and conflicts within the oppressive systems, to both maintain them and work against them insofar as they are meeting the needs of the community. Social workers must manage dual tasks/roles of maintaining jobs, funding and supports, while finding ways to critique and resist these systems that maintain unequal power relations. / Thesis / Master of Social Work (MSW)

No description available.

This study explores the meanings and understandings of home of seniors experiencing homelessness and the supports and services these individuals need in their homes as they age. Guided by interpretive social sciences and critical gerontology this study engaged with 7 homeless seniors living in a seniors’ shelter in the City of Toronto. Using arts-based research methodology, this study had 7 seniors make collages to represent their vision and understandings of ‘home’. In addition, participants were asked what specific support and services they would need in their homes in order to support their overall health and wellbeing. Based on individual art session recordings and collages, thematic analysis was used to identify key themes in order to understand what home means, and what supports and services are required for homeless seniors. For these participants home is a unique physical space with nuanced meanings and provides unique elements that a shelter cannot. In addition, these participants identified specific in-home and community supports they would require in their homes. / Thesis / Master of Social Work (MSW)

Houselessness is a prevalent issue in America's major cities. In large cities such as Washington, D.C., it is common to see people living on the streets and in public spaces. The underlying causes of houselessness are multifaceted, but it is evident that the city does not provide appropriate resources for these individuals to exist humanely. This study aims to comprehend the primary needs of a houseless person and determine how urban design solutions might provide resources to address those needs. For the investigation, SW Washington, DC's waterfront neighborhood was chosen. In its urban fabric, numerous unused or underutilized spaces have been observed. These spaces have the potential to be transformed into urban places that could make the city more supportive to the population without houses. A number of such resources have been identified. Several survey methods, such as non-participatory observation, and traffic and pedestrian counts, were utilized to obtain primary data for the research. In addition, diverse data sources, such as GIS data, journals, books, podcasts, television interviews, and website content, were consulted to obtain secondary data. Collected data was studied and synthesized to develop urban design ideas that can aid unsheltered individuals with their daily needs and make the city more hospitable. This research is not intended to solve the issue of homelessness in American cities; rather, it aims to highlight the needs of those impacted and propose possible intervention strategies in conjunction with other social services and design solutions (i.e., traditional shelters, traditional housing). The study also provides a brief overview of the causes of houselessness in the United States and an investigation into the lives of people living unsheltered. The outcome will give policymakers an understanding of how a city can facilitate its unfortunate residents. / Master of Science / Housing is a fundamental need for all people. What occurs when an individual loses their home and becomes houseless? He or she investigates potential alternatives. The alternatives can include a hotel or motel, a friend's or relative's house, a homeless shelter, and in desperate situations, a tent inside the city. This study primarily focuses on the houseless individuals who could not find any housing and sought out services in the city that a house provides. This study used the SW waterfront neighborhood of Washington, DC, as a study area and demonstrated the design of places within this city fabric that may lessen the challenges a houseless person may encounter. The study outcome proposes services like restrooms, shaded parking, cooking places, and places to lie down in various parts of the city. If implemented, it is expected that the city's fabric will be more hospitable to its unfortunate houseless citizens.