The Salvaging of Identities among Homeless Men: Reflections for Social Work

Abstract

This research reveals the social and individual processes that dominate the experiences of homeless men through an exploration of their struggle to achieve ontological worth. Drawing on eight in-depth interviews with homeless men who are experiencing homelessness, this research demonstrates this struggle is because of the situated nature of identities that homeless men continually reconstruct and renegotiate. It proposes that relations to this set of identities are relevant to homeless men, in particular the construction and reconstruction of their identities within homelessness. The central findings of this research reveal that homeless men actively manage their identities to cope with the instability inherent to the experience. The implications of this for social work practice are explored, focusing on the importance of self-conception and the restoration of positive identities.Homelessness in Australia remains a considerable social issue and large numbers of people continue to experience homelessness in an array of contexts and circumstances. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the complex social processes of homelessness and the ways in which subject positions, the socially constructed, fluid, and meaningful experiences that humans orient themselves within, are affected and altered by the experience of homelessness. This is investigated among homeless men, focusing on how they negotiate the impact of homelessness on their self-concept or self, the idea that people view themselves through the imagined eyes of others, as well as the multiple identities that comprise their self-concept.Through investigating ways in which homeless men salvage their identities from the negative social implications of homelessness, this research focuses on how they present relations to identities that establish self-worth and an integrated social self while deflecting the symbolic burden of homelessness. It is argued that this is negotiated by homeless men through a range of diversionary strategies and

Exploring the ‘Spoiled’ and ‘Celebrated’ Identities of Young and Homeless Drug Users

“…This finding was replicated by Terui and Hsieh (2016) who additionally found that not using drugs or alcohol, maintaining family or partner relationships and being responsible were also virtues emphasised by homeless people in their identity work to evidence that they did not fit with negative stereotypes. Likewise, as others have done (see, e.g., Roche, 2015), Terui and Hsieh (2016) found that individuals emphasised their past or present employment (or their desire to obtain employment) as a means of distancing themselves from the laziness that can characterise derogatory images of homeless people.…”

“…These strategies involved: (1) distancing oneself from roles, associations and institutions that are inconsistent with a person's actual or desired self-conception; (2) embracing a role, association or institution that is consistent with a person's actual or desired self-conception; and (3) fictive storytelling in which a person tells stories of their past, present or future that contains a fictional element. Subsequent studies have developed Snow and Anderson's (1987) work by identifying yet further strategies used by those experiencing street-based and shelter-based homelessness to preserve their sense of self-worth and protect against stigma (Meanwell, 2013;Rayburn & Guittar, 2013;Roche, 2015;Terui & Hsieh, 2016); some of these have focused exclusively on young homeless people (Farrugia et al, 2016;Kidd, 2007;Roschelle & Kaufman, 2004).…”