Living with Dignity: Home and Houselessness

    (Photo credit:  https://www.housediver.com/innovative-living/homes-alleviate-poverty)

The economy has been a hot topic as of late in the mainstream media. It’s a pressing issue for politicians heading into the upcoming midterms. Food, gas, and other necessities have become pricier with increasing inflation, exacerbated by an unstable geopolitical climate. Each day (and if not daily, each week) brings headlines in the news of rising costs and difficulties in the job market. Housing accessibility and affordability are no exception for those struggling in the current economy. It should be noted, however, that housing prices and the general lack of availability have been on the rise for years. When housing is largely unattainable because of the exorbitant prices, those without the means are left without housing. Those in this situation may crash at a friend or family’s home without a lease, live in their car, stay night by night at a hotel or motel, stay in a “homeless” shelter, squat in an abandoned building, etc. Often, when one thinks of houseless people, the image that comes to mind is a person sleeping out in the open, maybe with nothing, maybe with a blanket or sleeping bag. I recall years ago seeing a tent encampment along the Adena-Hock-Hocking bikeway on the way towards Nelsonville. Sometimes I’d see a person walk by with a shopping cart loaded with their belongings. That particular encampment has since been torn down by authority officials. Public opinion was mixed, with some praising the cops for removing the unsightly tents as if they were waste. Others criticized the cops for targeting an already vulnerable population. What I do not recall seeing as I scrolled through comment threads on news posts was anyone talking about the destruction of a community. In the face of economic struggle, people lean on their social network, and, in the case of many houseless people across the United States, this comes from the social bonds they’ve made in tent encampments.

Recently, I came across an article published by The New York Times (on September 26th, 2026) about an intentional community that was established by houseless people for houseless people. It began in 2000 after a community of houseless people set up camp next to a compost facility farther outside of Portland. Originally, the group consisted of a shopping cart caravan of up to around 80 people who would move together from one vacant public site to another. During that year, they had several standoffs with officials to fight for the right to their home. In 2001, the community moved to their current site to avoid another police sweep. They have lived there for 25 years, first as a tent encampment; then, as time went on, they built permanent structures with recycled and repurposed material. Currently, Dignity Village has 43 homes – termed “basic dwelling structures” for legal purposes as the city reluctantly lets them continue living there as a “camp designation.” Otherwise, the buildings would have to be built according to code. Each home has a bed, a propane heater, and some electricity provided by solar panels donated to them by another non-profit. The village also contains a computer lab, communal bathhouse with portable toilets, a greenhouse that also functions as an overnight shelter in winter, a guard shack, and the Commons. The Commons is a shared space for the residents to congregate in that acts as the communal kitchen, living room, and courtroom. 

The residents manage their community self-autonomously; they elect their own council, take turns on the guard watch, and are each required to complete 10 hours of reproductive labor to maintain the village. Self-autonomy and “familyship” are the backbone of the community, providing residents with a sense of dignity and freedom, unlike what they personally find in local homeless shelters. The homeless shelters, or even the city-run tiny home communities in this case, have many rules to follow and restrict access for couples, families, or those with pets. The several rules and constant check-ins from those working at the institution can leave houseless people feeling not at home. And yet, officials reject Dignity Village and other similar independent villages because they do not fit the housing standards. They cite issues with waste and pollution that, as quoted in the article: “post life-safety, health, equity, and infrastructure for both residents of the self-operated shelter and the surrounding community.” In addition to this sentiment, there is the belief that shelters are better solutions to “homelessness” because they fit within the modern home paradigm. Here we see reference to “homelessness” being framed as a threat to the status quo, to the separation of public and private, and to the idealized version of home (Cresswell 2004, Whitson 2007). 

In our society, the ideal of home is, as worded by Dr. Risa Whitson (2007), a “social imaginary.” Home is a space that is produced by both social relations and a set of rules (Whitson 2007, Wood and Beck 1994, Valentine 2001). It is not just the people within a home that determine what is and is not truly a home, but society at large via actions such as zoning, code enforcement, and policing of public space (Cresswell 2004, Whitson 2007). Homes are expected to have a roof, a front door, at least four walls, a kitchen, a bathroom, a bedroom, and access to running water and electricity (Wood and Beck 1994). Homes are expected to house a singular nuclear family with a wife, husband, and children. They are private sanctuaries, separate from the public sphere (Whitson 2007). In his article, Valentine (2001) mentions how before the rise of industrialism, homes included houses in which people lived communally. Yet with time, societal pressure pushed people to move into single-family homes. Communal living, however, continues to be a way for people to alleviate financial burdens. Tent encampments and independent villages like Dignity Village allow their residents to lean on each other for mutual aid and community support, including pooling resources and providing safety in numbers. Some members in Dignity Village call their connection with other residents a “familyship,” breaking the societal norm of what a family is expected to be.

To the people living at Dignity Village, their community is their home. They have the freedom to exist as they are. Dignity Village has only five basic rules that relate to safety and building community. For the residents and for houseless communities, the meaning of home does not center around an idealized house. It centers around the community, their pets, their personal belongings they carry with them, etc. Valentine (2001) lists some meanings of home as: shelter, hearth, heart, privacy, roots, abode, paradise. Tents, shacks, or city structures like bridges can provide shelter from the elements and an abode. Having privacy in their tents, shacks, and small homes provides privacy and the freedom to create a comfortable space for themselves (hearth). This freedom also allows them to create a source of identity and establish roots. The connections they have with one another can provide a source of mutual support (heart). Beyond their connections to one another, it is the shared routines and practices they have that contribute to the collective homemaking. Together, they produce a village from public space through meaningful arrangement of structures and objects (Whitson 2007). They make home. It is for this reason that I refuse to use the term “homeless.” To call houseless people “homeless” is to presuppose that they share this belief. It belittles their efforts in creating homes. And as some academics have argued, those who have a house they live in may not feel at home (i.e., domestic abuse victims) (Cresswell 2004, Whitson 2007, Valentine 2001). 

This topic is personal for me. At one point in my life, I lost my home. I was kicked out and did not have a stable job. A friend opened up their home for me to stay in temporarily. Although I was housed, it did not feel like home. I grieved for the home I lost and struggled with the trauma of abandonment. I was protected from the elements, but I could not use the fridge as it was always stocked full. The table was usually covered, so I ate at my small desk. I did not feel comfortable changing the decor as I was only permitted to stay there for at most three months. It was only because of rental assistance through a non-profit that I could afford a place of my own. Yet again, it was only for three months. Thankfully, I was able to find stable housing after the three months at this apartment. But that experience left a deep impression on me. Homelessness or homelessness can happen to many of us – 40% of US Americans are within one bad event of falling into poverty (Passy 2019). And while poverty doesn’t mean that one would become houseless or homeless, it could make them more vulnerable to the possibility, especially if they can no longer afford to pay rent or their mortgage. According to the Ohio Department of Housing Finance Agency (2026), “Over 1.2 million Ohioans (11%) live in a household spending at least half its income on housing, putting them at risk of losing their homes to foreclosure or eviction.” And when you end up losing your house, it can become difficult to pull yourself back out. 

In an Ezra Klein Show episode about homelessness in California (2023), they describe a situation of a man who lost his home. He then lived in his car, but after his car received so many parking tickets, he lost his car because of the mounting fees. He then stayed at an encampment, but struggled to find work because he had no car to drive to work, nor did he have reliable access to running water to clean himself for interviews. That is why community support is so important. Barth and Nagoka’s article (2026) highlights how residents at Dignity Village feel motivated by one another to strive for better housing. In fact, the success rate for Dignity Village residents finding permanent housing is higher than that of those who live at institutionalized homeless places, 60 percent to 42 percent, respectively. The 25-year success of Dignity Village has inspired several other self-autonomous villages for houseless people, such as Right 2 Dream Too, Hazelnut Grove, Opportunity Village Eugene, and more. 

 

References:

External sources -
Barth, Brian, and Ricardo Nagaoka. 2026. “The Homeless Community That Became a Self-Governed Village.” The New York Times, September 26, 2026. https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/26/headway/portland-diginity-village-homeless-community.html.

“Dignity Village.” n.d. Dignity Village. Accessed September 28, 2026. https://dignityvillage.org. 

Ohio Housing Finance Agency. 2026 “Housing Instability & Homelessness (FY26) - Housing Needs Assessment | Ohio Housing Finance Agency.” Ohiohome.Org. 2026. https://ohiohome.org/research/housinginstability-25.aspx. 

Passy, Jacob. 2019. “Millions of Americans Are Just One Paycheck Away from ‘Financial Disaster.’” MarketWatch. Accessed September 28, 2026. https://www.marketwatch.com/story/half-of-americans-are-just-one-paycheck-away-from-financial-disaster-2019-05-16. 

 

Class sources -

Cresswell, Tim. 2004. Place: A Short Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Pp. 109-117.

Valentine, Gill. 2001. Social Geographies: Space and Society. Essex, England: Pearson Education Ltd. Pp 63-75.

“What We Learned From the Deepest Look at Homelessness in Decades.Links to an external site.” The Ezra Klein Show, July 18, 2023.

Whitson, 2017. “Spaces of Culture and Identity Production: Home, Consumption, and the Media.” Pp. 48-75 in Feminist Spaces: Gender and Geography in a Global Context by Ann M. Oberhauser, Jennifer L. Fluri, Risa Whitson and Sharlene Mollett. New York: Routledge. 

Wood, Denis and Robert J. Beck. Home Rules. Baltimore, MD: The John Hopkins University Press. Pp. 1-7, 13-23.