Introduction

Abstract

The homeless person is an evocative social character of late modernity. Homelessness encapsulates many things: destitution, displacement, poverty, criminality, fear, pity, crisis, anomie, (Fooks & Pantazis, 1999; Somerville, 1992). The homeless are archetypal ‘outsiders’, and, even in a modern world that apparently celebrates plurality and difference, it remains that ‘homelessness is distinguished by a lack of social status, invisibility, as a ‘problem’ to others, with the homeless being seen as outcast and rejected, at the bottom of the social scale, disreputable and nicheless’ (Somerville, 1992:532). Homelessness is a social problem that has been a key focus of recent policy developments and of ‘targeting’ by the state (Dean, 1999), particularly in the UK. This indicates the strong currency that homelessness has as a discursively understood phenomenon (Anderson, 2004; May, Cloke & Johnsen, 2005). There has been much research and debate into homelessness in recent years (for example, Anderson, Kemp & Quilgars, 1993; Kennett & Marsh, 1999; Jacobs, Kemeny & Manzi, 1999; Fitzpatrick, Kemp & Klinker, 2000) and sophisticated development of knowledge about why homelessness occurs and how it can be understood. However there has been little exploration of transitions through homelessness, over time, with a focus on the experiences of the individuals making these transirions that ties them to broader theoretical frameworks.