MAPPING THE PARALLEL LIVES OF HOMELESSNESS IN WASHINGTON DC by Alice Peck A ...

207 Pages·2015·0.71 MB·English

CREATING INTERSECTIONS: MAPPING THE PARALLEL LIVES OF
HOMELESSNESS IN WASHINGTON D.C.

by

Alice Peck
A Thesis
Submitted to the
Graduate Faculty
of
George Mason University
in Partial Fulfillment of
The Requirements for the Degree
of
Master of Science
Conflict Analysis and Resolution

Committee:

___________________________________________ Chair of Committee

___________________________________________

___________________________________________

___________________________________________ Graduate Program Director

___________________________________________ Dean, School for Conflict
Analysis and Resolution

Date: _____________________________________ Fall Semester 2015
George Mason University
Fairfax, VA
Creating Intersections: Mapping the Parallel Lives of Homelessness in Washington D.C.
A Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of
Science at George Mason University
by
Alice Peck
Bachelor of Science
University of Bristol, 2012
Director: Leslie K. Dwyer, Professor
School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution
Fall Semester 2015
George Mason University
Fairfax, VA
Copyright 2015 Alice Peck
All Rights Reserved

ii
DEDICATION
I dedicate my thesis to the individuals who are at its centre, with whom I had the
privilege and utter pleasure of spending the past ten months.
iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This thesis has been a journey for me, both intellectual and emotional, and I give my
wholehearted thanks to all those who have helped me along its way. I thank the staff and
volunteers at House of Francis, who welcomed me into their community and inspired me;
I am in awe of their constant passion and commitment. I thank my family and friends
whose love, laughter, and encouragement kept me nourished. I thank the intellectual
community of colleagues, staff, and professors at the School for Conflict Analysis and
Resolution, especially Dr. Leslie Dwyer, Dr. Tehama Lopez Bunyasi, and Dr. Susan
Hirsch, whose trust and guidance empowered me to follow my heart in my research.

iv
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page
List of Abbreviations ........................................................................................................ vii
Abstract ............................................................................................................................ viii
Chapter One: HOMELESSNESS AS VIOLENCE ............................................................ 1
Chapter Two: ANTHROPOLOGICAL APPROACHES TO UNDERSTANDING
VIOLENCE ......................................................................................................................... 9
Ethnography .................................................................................................................... 9
Participant Observation ................................................................................................. 12
Interviews ...................................................................................................................... 14
Trust and Presentation of Self ....................................................................................... 15
Language, Voice, Tense, Representation ...................................................................... 17
Chapter Three: DOGS BEFORE HUMANS .................................................................... 22
Chapter Four: MAPPING HOMELESSNESS IN THE UNITED STATES .................... 29
Overview of Homelessness in the USA ........................................................................ 29
Definitions of Homelessness ......................................................................................... 31
Reasons for Homelessness ............................................................................................ 35
State of Homelessness in the United States .................................................................. 38
Theoretical Approaches to Understanding Homelessness ............................................ 42
Chapter Five: SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONTEXT OF WASHINGTON D.C. ....... 53
Chapter Six: SPACES OF THE CITY: EXCLUSION AND CONTAINMENT ............. 60
Right to the City ............................................................................................................ 60
Polarizing Forces ........................................................................................................... 70
Spatial Identities ............................................................................................................ 77
Chapter SEVEN: SPATIAL CONTAINMENT AND REGULATION OF TIME .......... 89
Spaces for the Homeless ............................................................................................... 94
Heterotopias of Homelessness ...................................................................................... 96
Theft of Dignity, Denial of Community ...................................................................... 103
v
Chapter EIGHT: CONTESTATION FOR PLACE WITHIN “PUBLIC SPACE” OF
WASHINGTON D.C. ..................................................................................................... 109
The Right to the Toilet ................................................................................................ 109
Museums ..................................................................................................................... 119
Libraries ...................................................................................................................... 122
Union Station .............................................................................................................. 126
Chapter NINE: SPACES OF THE USA: INTERSECTIONS OF NEOLIBERALISM 136
Symbolic Violence and Enduring Allegiance ............................................................. 137
Unequal Beginnings and Habitus Formation .............................................................. 148
Chapter TEN: UNTOUCHABLE SPACES ................................................................... 155
Resistance through Memory: the Power of the Past ................................................... 159
Untouchable Faith ....................................................................................................... 165
Chapter ELEVEN: CONCLUSIONS - CREATING INTERSECTIONS ...................... 169
Appendix ......................................................................................................................... 177
References ....................................................................................................................... 188

vi
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ................................................................ CDC
Conflict Analysis and Resolution ................................................................................. CAR
District of Columbia ...................................................................................................... D.C.
District of Columbia Housing Authority ................................................................... DCHA
Helping the Homeless ..................................................................................................... HtH
House of Francis ............................................................................................................ HoF
Institute for Children and Poverty ............................................... ICP
Institute for Children, Poverty, and Homelessness ...................................................... ICPH
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer .......................................................... LGBTQ
Martin Luther King ....................................................................................................... MLK
National Alliance to End Homelessness .................................................................... NAEH
National Coalition for the Homeless ............................................................................. NCH
National Health Care for the Homeless Council ..................................................... NCHCH
North East ........................................................................................................................ NE
National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty .................................................. NLCHP
North of Massachusetts Avenue ................................................................................. NoMa
North West ...................................................................................................................... NW
Point in Time....................................................................................................................PIT
Single Room Occupancies ............................................................................................. SRO
South of Houston Street ............................................................................................... SoHo
South of Market ........................................................................................................... SoMa
Supplemental Security Income ........................................................................................ SSI
United Kingdom ............................................................................................................... UK
United Nations ................................................................................................................. UN
United Nations Regional Information Centre ........................................................... UNRIC
United States ................................................................................................................. USA
United States Department of Health and Human Services ........................................... HHS
United States Department of Housing and Urban Development .................................. HUD

vii
ABSTRACT
CREATING INTERSECTIONS: MAPPING THE PARALLEL LIVES OF
HOMELESSNESS IN WASHINGTON D.C.
Alice Peck, M.S.
George Mason University, 2015
Thesis Director: Dr. Leslie K. Dwyer

This thesis explores homelessness in Washington D.C. Drawing from eight
months of ethnographic fieldwork, I consider experiences of homelessness in the
changing urban space of Washington D.C., contextualizing these within the broader
forces of neoliberalism. Situating personal narratives within the social and physical
spaces in which daily life unravels, I critically analyse the denial of space and place to
people who are homeless, whose existence as homeless bodies represents stark
contradictions to normative ideals of neoliberal subjects. I draw on theories of symbolic,
structural, and everyday violence to argue that to be homeless is to exist within a category
of precarity and powerlessness in the parallel margins of society – the spaces in which
paradoxically different, concurrent lives are chartered.

viii
CHAPTER ONE: HOMELESSNESS AS VIOLENCE
This thesis draws on eight months of ethnographic fieldwork to consider the
denial of place and space for people who are homeless within Washington D.C. Through
data collected from interviews and participant observation, I analyse the ways in which
several people experience the violence of homelessness within the context of the
changing urban spaces of D.C., and the broader neoliberal political and economic
structures of the United States of America. My research explores how people who are
homeless in Washington D.C. navigate the places through which routine life unravels –
the places of home, employment, leisure, travel, community, and culture that are the
taken for granted social and physical spaces of life. I consider how access to these spaces
is not guaranteed for all; for people who are homeless and existing on precarious margins
of society, the right to these spaces involves a complex struggle for place and recognition
in a context where admission corresponds with status and socio-economic position.
I argue that the continued denial of place to people who are homeless represents a
form of violence that both constrains the physical settings in which the homeless can
visibly be, and regulates the social and personal spaces in which the homeless can realise
a sense of self, humanity, and dignity. Despite sharing a common humanness within the
same city, people who are homeless are forced to inhabit a parallel world in which
paradoxically different, concurrent lives are chartered.
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