Tell Them Who I Am: The Lives of Homeless Women - Softcover

Liebow, Elliot

Softcover

ISBN 10: 014024137X ISBN 13: 9780140241372

Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group, 1995

Synopsis

"One of the very best things ever written about homeless people in the nation."—Jonathan Kozol.

About this title

About the Author

Elliot Liebow was a celebrated anthropologist and sociologist, best known for his books Tally's Corner and Tell Them Who I Am: The Lives of Homeless Women. A graduate of George Washington University, the University of Maryland, and Catholic University, Liebow served for many years at the National Institute of Mental Health as chief of the Center for the Study of Work and Mental Health, followed by a period spent volunteering at a homeless shelter for women. In 1990, he was appointed to the Patrick Cardinal O'Boyle Professorship at Catholic University's National Catholic School for Social Service, a position he held until his death in 1994.Liebow received numerous awards and honors in his lifetime. Among others, they include the National Alliance to End Homelessness's John W. Macy Award, the President's Medal of the Catholic University of America, and the Lee Founders Award of the Society for the Study of Social Problems.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Several women reported losing jobs or the opportunity to get them when their homelessness became known. Carolyn sneered, "An employment clerk marked my application 'No suitable jobs available' because 'We don't refer bag-carrying applicants to interviews.'" Kim had been working as a receptionist in a doctor's office for several weeks when the doctor learned she was living in a shelter and fired her. "If I had known you lived in a shelter," Kim said the doctor told her, "I would never have hired you. Shelters are places of disease." "No," said Kim. "Doctors' offices are places of disease."

People are not homeless because they are physically disabled, mentally ill, abusers of alcohol or other drugs, or unemployed. However destructive and relevant these conditions may be, they do not explain homelessness; most physically disabled people, most mentally ill people, most alcoholics and drug addicts, and most unemployed persons do have places to live....Clearly, then, there is no necessary connection between these conditions and homelessness. Homeless people are homeless because they do not have a place to live.

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 014024137X
• ISBN 13: 9780140241372
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 368