Tell Them Who I Am

March 1, 1993
Liebow ( Talley's Corner ) here succeeds in demolishing the anonymity of the homeless. Skillfully blending a social scientist's objectivity with humanitarian concern, he observes women who live in a variety of shelters near Washington, D.C.--how they interact with one another, family and shelter staff; pass their days; and struggle to retain their dignity in the face of rejection by society. Liebow maintains that homelessness is a Catch-22, with few ways out; that homeless women are remarkably supportive of one another; that shelter workers are often dedicated, but also scared and autocratic in spite of their best intentions; that the men in these women's lives seldom offer help; and that homeless mothers are propelled by ties, however flimsy, to their children. Liebow's probing and morally honest report reveals hard truths about the humanity and inhumanity of us all.

June 1, 1993
%% This is a multi-book review: SEE also the title "A Nation in Denial." %% In 1984, anthropologist Liebow (author of "Tally's Corner: A Study of Negro Streetcorner Men" [1967]) began volunteering at a soup kitchen and at shelters for homeless women because--retired from the National Institutes of Health because of disability, and undergoing cancer treatment--he had "a lot of time on [his] hands." "Tell Them Who I Am" explores "the enormous effort that most of [the women] made to secure the most elementary necessities and decencies of life"--food, shelter, and safe storage for their treasured personal possessions; a job or public assistance; nondemeaning relationships with their families and service providers--and the personal characteristics that helped them "remain human in an unremittingly dehumanizing environment." The women whose stories form the heart of Liebow's study are vivid individuals; the reader quickly learns to recognize the characteristic "voices" of Judy, Kim, Peggy, Queen, Betty, Grace, Lisa, and others.Like Liebow, Burnes and Baum have hands-on experience with homelessness and reject the distinction between the deserving and the undeserving poor that has for centuries defined society's responses to poverty and homelessness. But where Liebow sees homelessness as inevitable unless government intervenes in an economic system that demands losers as well as winners, Baum and Burnes see homeless people as distinctly different from--and sicker than--other poor Americans. Their book's central contention, based on what they call emerging research, is that "up to 85 percent of all homeless adults suffer from chronic alcoholism, drug addiction, mental illness, or some combination of the three, often complicated by serious medical problems." But the authors' political agenda is clear in their attacks on advocates (the late Mitch Snyder, Jonathan Kozol et al.), researchers, and reporters who believe homelessness has systemic causes. Although Baum and Burnes recognize and want to dispel the stigma that society still attaches to mental illness and substance abuse, their analysis has its roots in the "tough love" concepts of current addiction-treatment models. "There is nothing wrong with medicalizing' the problems," they proclaim, "if the purpose is to obtain medical treatment for those who need it." Baum and Burnes praise the work of Philadelphia's Diagnostic and Rehabilitation Center and the Portland [Oregon] Model as useful examples of an appropriate approach to the medical, psychological, and substance abuse problems of homeless people. ((Reviewed June 1993))(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 1993, American Library Association.)