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The aim of this presentation is to share some experiences within our joint project “Exploring Homelessness and Pathways to Social Inclusion: A Comparative Study of Contexts and Challenges in Swiss and Croatian Cities” (CSRP). The Swiss and Croatian team intend to present some of the values and challenges of using ethnographic methods in homelessness research. Participant observation, longitudinal, in-depth interviews, walk alongs as well as field notes and personal diaries are some of the ethnographic methods that we used within this holistic project that includes homeless people and practitioners. We hope that these methods will create a space for the articulation of authentic lived experiences of homelessness and further provide an in-depth understanding of the contexts and heterogeneity of homelessness in each respective country. In this research, we gained access to homeless people through fieldwork at homeless shelters/centres and volunteering. This was of value because it allowed our teams to participate in and observe some homeless people’s daily practices, routines and behavior. By using ethnographic methods, we can witness and learn about how people feel about their situations and how they interpret their world. We were also able to gain a better understanding of the complexities of an individual’s situations in the context of homelessness. We will also present some of the challenges that we have experienced during our research related to building relationships and trust with homeless people, ethical concerns, possible loss of material due to authorization, staying in contact with research participants, the unpredictability of fieldwork and field locations as well as a range of emotional challenges that we encountered in the field. It is hoped that through presenting these experiences we can pinpoint the specific values and challenges of using ethnographic methods in homelessness research. |
