Time seizures and the self: institutional temporalities and self-preservation among homeless women.

Abstract

This article documents temporalities of homelessness as experienced by many homeless people today, those living in the midst of an urban "services ghetto"-where social service organizations abound, but such organizations fail to coordinate the provision or timing of services, producing an incoherent multiplicity of offerings and schedules. I analyzed distinct but related temporal modes by which institutional timetables controlled homeless women's existence, what I call empty time and overscheduled time. The paradoxes of institutionalized waiting and strict yet inconsistent timetables exacted profound material and psychological tolls. For homeless women in Chicago, many of whom experienced symptoms of severe mental illness, simply securing their daily needs was such a time-consuming endeavor that they had to focus on short-term self-preservation rather than seeking stable employment or housing. Using anthropological theories of self and subjectivity, I argue that what was at stake for many women was more than the exhaustion of shelter life-negotiating institutional timetables also threatened their sense of dignity and humanity. Through the everyday patterning of women's time, non-profit agencies whose stated aim was to eliminate homelessness paradoxically frustrated women's efforts to escape life on the streets. I conclude the analysis with policy suggestions to address these problems.