Review by Choice Review
This ethnography by Wasserman (Texas Tech Univ.) and Clair (Univ. of Alabama, Birmingham) explores street homelessness in the city of Birmingham, Alabama. The authors describe the difficulties of trying to define "the street homeless" as a population as well as the challenges they faced during the course of their fieldwork. Acknowledging that the prevalence of mental health and substance abuse problems among the street homeless is disproportionately high, the authors reject the notion that these problems are a primary cause of homelessness. Rather, they point to the importance of "social structural" factors, including the labor market, culture, family, health, and crime. Wasserman and Clair describe the contentious relationship that exists between the street homeless and the local business community. They also examine the contradictions between the personal attitudes of providers of services to homeless people and the medical model that governs service provision. Summing Up: Recommended. All academic levels/libraries. A. Dworsky University of Chicago, Chapin Hall
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Library Journal Review
"What they told us just did not fit with what we had heard from the experts," write authors Wasserman (sociology, Texas Tech Univ.) and Clair (sociology, Univ. of Alabama, Birmingham) in their preface, and this candor and determination to understand the underpinnings of homelessness in this country inform this splendid book. "As a society, how we deal with those who are homeless typically wavers between subtle paternalism and heavy-handed authoritarianism," they report after experiencing the "complexities and apparent contradictions" of street life for themselves and closely observing what began as a distrusting population and ended with real friendships. The authors' near-disarming sincerity is offset by the reliability of their reports and familiarity with the existing literature, as well as the useful index and list of references. Candid throughout, they conclude "by offering, not solutions on how to end homelessness, but rather insights about how to begin to think about it in new ways." VERDICT This meditation on friendship as much as a cutting-edge report on homelessness is recommended for public policy players, psychologists, social workers, urban planners, sociologists, and anyone interested in the vicissitudes-and pleasures-of the research process.-Ellen D. Gilbert, Princeton, NJ (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
