Young Homeless People and Urban Space: Fixed in Mobility

Young Homeless People and Urban Space: Fixed in Mobility is one of 15 books published in the series “Routledge Advances in Ethnography”, which showcases innovative ethnographic work by both new and established scholars. In this book’s case the ethnographic research documented and analysed stems from Emma Jackson’s PhD research, which took place between 2007 and 2009 at a day centre for young homeless people in Euston, London. According to the author, the book “explores the spaces that young homeless people move through in order to pick apart how institutions, structures, and biographies intervene in and create spaces of homelessness that in turn shape future trajectories and possibilities” (page 2). In particular, it examines “how homeless spaces and the city are lived, perpetuated, and experienced by young people in London” (page 3) and what this reveals about urban mobility, both spatial and economic.

Jackson starts with an introduction that briefly presents the research framework upon which the book is based. Chapter 1 describes Fresh Start. This is the day centre where Jackson carried out her research as a volunteer over 14 months. Jackson uses the day centre as a prism to examine how homeless places change over time and respond to policy and funding requirements (pages 24–25). She also highlights how homeless young people use the day centre and how for long-term clients it acts as almost a “home space” (page 22). Chapter 2 continues the focus on the day centre Fresh Start as the author examines how “super diverse” biographies of youth using the centre are produced and negotiated within this homeless space (pages 30 and 45). In Chapter 3 Jackson discusses the difficulties of asking people to share their life stories and describes several alternative participatory methods, including mapping and filmmaking, which she adopted in her ethnographic research to learn about young people’s experiences of London (pages 6 and 64).

The following three chapters proceed to interpret the collective picture from these “little glimpses…of their worlds” (page 64). Chapter 4 considers “the kinds of mobilities that characterise the lives of young homeless people” (page 86) and introduces the concept that they are “fixed in mobility”, as mobility takes on both positive and negative meanings (page 67). Chapter 5 continues this focus but specifically explores how networks of systems combine with existing geographies to shape and constrain the mobility of young homeless people (pages 6 and 86). Chapter 6 then hones in on the hostel as a “place of progress” and examines how lives of homeless youth become entwined there (page 6). Jackson also builds upon the picture of how surveillance and governance impact the lives of young homeless people (page 123).

Chapter 7 traces how the past and present of young homeless people affects how they understand their future (page 127). And in conclusion, Chapter 8 discusses three overarching themes – “the right to belong, the right to stay still, and the right to a future” – as Jackson reflects on how her research may expand how we conceptualize the right to the city (page 147). This is a personal, thought-provoking book that challenges and informs our understanding of homelessness in a global city like London. Young Homeless People and Urban Space would be a useful resource for sociologists, planners and policymakers alike, among others interested in the topic of homelessness.

Book note prepared by Hannah Keren Lee