Deakin University
Browse

Academic Knowledge and Contemporary Poverty: The Politics of Homelessness Research

Version 2 2024-06-06, 05:45
Version 1 2023-03-22, 05:28
journal contribution
posted on 2024-06-06, 05:45 authored by David FarrugiaDavid Farrugia, J Gerrard
This article explores the field of homelessness research in relation to the dynamics of contemporary inequality and governmentality, arguing that the dominant perspectives within this field have developed in ways that can converge with the demands of neoliberal governance. The article discusses the causal focus of much homelessness research, the emergence of the ‘orthodoxy’ of homelessness research and new approaches emphasising subjectivity and arguing for a ‘culture of homelessness’. We suggest that homelessness has been constructed as a discrete analytical object extraordinary to the social relations of contemporary inequality. The authority to represent homelessness legitimately has been constituted through positioning ‘the homeless’ outside of a community of valorised and normatively legitimate subjectivities. The article concludes with reflections on an alternative politics of homelessness research that moves towards a critical engagement with the position of homelessness within the structural dynamics of late modernity.

History

Journal

Sociology

Volume

50

Pagination

267-284

Location

London, Eng.

ISSN

0038-0385

eISSN

1469-8684

Language

en

Publication classification

C1.1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal

Issue

2

Publisher

SAGE Publications

Usage metrics

    Research Publications

    Exports

    RefWorks
    BibTeX
    Ref. manager
    Endnote
    DataCite
    NLM
    DC