“This Right Here Is All About Living”: Communicating the “Common Sense” About Home Stability Through CBPR and Photovoice

Abstract

Homelessness remains a major problem in the United States as a result of urban deprivation, economic decline, a rise in housing costs, and a decline in blue-collar wages. Meanwhile, the dominant discourses around homelessness tend to frame the matter in terms of individual deviance rather than structural impediments. This study utilizes Community-Based Participatory Research and the photovoice method to articulate what a small number of “successfully home stable individuals” attribute to helping them to remain home stable as well as those factors that challenge this situation. The study analyzes how these attributions challenge the “common sense” about homelessness by refiguring the concept as a reintegration process with manifold causes and paths into and out of episodic home instability and giving voice to formerly homeless individuals who are successfully navigating reintegration into housed society.

Keywords:

• CBPR
• Home Stability
• Homelessness
• Photovoice
• Participatory Research

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the participants and the staff at SNAP for their assistance with this project.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jeffery Chaichana Peterson

Jeffery Chaichana Peterson is an Associate Professor in the Edward R. Murrow College of Communication at Washington State University. He received a PhD in Intercultural Communication from the University of New Mexico and his research currently focuses on culture, communication, and social change. He has most recently published in Health Communication, Health Education & Behavior, and Journal of International and Intercultural Communication

Mary Grace Antony

Mary Grace Antony is an Assistant Professor in Communication Studies at Schreiner University. She received a PhD in Communication from the Edward R. Murrow College of Communication at Washington State University. Her research interests include globalization, media, culture, and new media technologies. Her research has appeared in Journal of Intercultural Communication Research, Journal of International and Intercultural Communication, and New Media & Society

Ryan J. Thomas

Ryan J. Thomas is an Assistant Professor in the University of Missouri School of Journalism. He received his PhD from the ER Murrow College of Communication at WSU. His research interests include media ethics and the representation of class and labor in the public domain. His scholarship has been published in Journalism Studies and Journalism Practice