The changing face of homelessness: Federal policy, gender, the media, and the emergence of an “invisible” population

Tauna Starbuck Sisco, Purdue University

Abstract

In the late 1980s, the United States enacted the first and only federal policy, the McKinney Act, addressing homelessness at a national level. Under the Reagan administration, numerous programs focusing on the poorer segments of society experienced cutbacks. However, homeless policy at the federal level for the first time flourished. In a qualitative and quantitative analysis of federal Congressional bills and hearings on homelessness from 1977-1988 as well as a media analysis, I report on significant increases in the social construction of the homeless, changing from a deviant population to a dependent population, as well as an increase in the social problem status of homelessness in American society. Most poignantly, this research focused on the role of gender and the family, as women and children became the new face of the homeless in our society. Results indicated that although discourse on homeless women, children, and families were (1) increasing, and (2) involved positive sympathetic constructions of the groups by both the media and political elites, there failed to be any substantive policy action that focused only on these homeless groups at the Congressional level. Rather Congressional bills which involved homeless veterans, work programs for homeless individuals, or pregnant homeless individuals had the greatest probability of becoming public law and receiving monetary compensation. Although the “new face” of the homeless was women, children, and families, this facet only garnered more public and Congressional elite sympathy, no monetary sympathy at the national level.

Degree

Ph.D.

Advisors

Spencer, Purdue University.

Subject Area

Public administration|Public policy|Mass communications

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