Crossing the Border: Encounters Between Homeless People

By Michael Rowe

Book Overview

The relationship between the homeless and the social service community marks a border where the disenfranchised meet the mainstream of society. Crossing the Border, the first book-length study of outreach work to the mentally ill homeless, uses ethnographic tools to examine encounters at this border. Michael Rowe provides a rich picture not only of a particular group of homeless people, but also of the complicated interactions between the marginalized and those who try to help them. As it examines both the dilemmas and opportunities of outreach work to the mentally ill homeless, this compelling study asks us to consider the broader questions about how we relate to the poor and other marginal persons at the border of society.

The author's personal encounters with the homeless as Director of the New Haven ACCESS outreach project, his interviews with fifty homeless persons for this study, and his numerous interviews with outreach staff, provide an invaluable personal perspective. In this study, Rowe draws a collective portrait of the homeless whom he interviewed and observed, discusses the outreach workers in depth, examines transactions from the perspective of each party, and finally, places these encounters within the social and institutional contexts that shape them.

Rowe's writing is accessible and punctuated with many vivid anecdotes. As Crossing the Border shows, encounters between the homeless and outreach workers represent a measure of where we will set our social boundaries and what standard of living we will accept for those who live at that boundary.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0520218833
• ISBN13: 9780520218833
• Release Date: September 1999
• Publisher: Perseus - Ucal Pod
• Length: 206 Pages
• Weight: 0.57 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

Very well done...

Having been an outreach worker for roughly six years, I found this book to be surprisingly well written. Too often, books tackling this subject present mere caracatures of the people it talks about, vieweing the subjects more as data or political process than real human beings. This book presents many different points of views and differing types of outreach workers and the people they seek to help. The homeless are not condescended to nor are the outreach workers glamorized. It is quite factual and quite objective.I saw myself in some of the types and picked up excellent little reminders about the whole homeless issue and those whose lives it affects. If you are looking for a bit more of the 'human' connection of those who are on the front lines (as opposed to the theorists, the politicians, the directors and others removed from the field), this is a great book toward that end.

MSDQ Book News

"Rowe provides a rich picture not only of a particular group of homeless people, but also of the complicated interactions between the marginalized and those who try to help them." -MDSQ Book News

Crossing the Border

Crossing the Border makes a noteworthy contribution to the field [of qualitative studies of outreach work.] It should be considered an essential read for everyone- from administrators to those on the front line- working with the most marginalized among the homeless.

Crossing the Border

Crossing the Border by Michael Rowe clearly conveys why most white, middle-class professional will never become homeless...Rowe's pragmatic examination dispels myths about people who are homeless and the experts who help them. Crossing the Border could command a wide audience of professional mental health care workers, sociologists, anthropologists, bureaucrats, advocates, and policy makers.