When a person becomes displaced (homeless), he or she has few options for finding a new residence. One such option is a transitional living program. Transitional living programs provide residence to such persons under the premise that while they reside in such a facility, they will continuously be working in tandem with their case manager and other service providers to once more become self-sufficient when leaving the program.
This thesis examines one transitional living program in the Central Florida area, which I will call the Women's Transitional Living Facility (WTLF). This program serves only women and their children. I analyze the intended function of the WTLF and its actual practices, based on ethnographic fieldwork, including participant-observation and semi-structured interviews, with people who serve, have served, or are residing within the Women's Transitional Living Facility. In exploring the actual functioning of this transitional living facility, I investigate the positive and negative effects of the rules in place in this institution, and how they are applied by the staff of the WTLF.
I employ the term "displaced," used in recent publications by some social scientists, as this term does not carry the negative connotations of "homeless." More importantly, it does not deny the population it represents notions of belonging, or of being a member of a secure place. Persons traditionally considered "homeless" may still maintain the sense of a "home" through alternative means such as within a shelter, a flop house, or a tent community (Wardhaugh 1999).
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ucf.edu/oai:stars.library.ucf.edu:honorstheses1990-2015-1348 |
| Date | 01 January 2003 |
| Creators | Adams, Elise K. |
| Publisher | STARS |
| Source Sets | University of Central Florida |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Source | HIM 1990-2015 |
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