Health, Housing, and Homelessness: An Ethnographic Understanding of Housing Instability and Social Care

Examining the fundamental relationship between housing and health, this perceptive volume illuminates how the health of those living with housing instability is affected by the day-to-day issues they face. Based on a series of interviews with both those affected by this issue and health and social care practitioners, as well as ethnographic observations at multiple sites of a health care centre, this book examines how housing instability shapes both the health services that people are able to access and their own approach to self-care. It highlights how housing instability is inextricably linked to poorer health outcomes, and suggests how individual, collective, and institutional practices can be reimagined to address the disparity between those with and without a stable home. This book will interest scholars and students across the Sociology of Health and Illness, Social Work, Public Health, and Social Policy, as well as practitioners in this field.