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poverty in children and families
social impacts of homelessness
social impacts of homelessness
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Introduction
In the United States, 1.5 million children are homeless. 1.5 million children are without adequate shelter, nourishment, healthcare, or education. When a child is homeless, it is not just a house that they are without. They are more likely than other children to experience hunger, constant illness, mental disorders, and developmental delays.1 Being homeless negatively affects a child’s overall welfare and ability to thrive within their community throughout their childhood and into their adulthood. It impedes their ability to live a healthy life and gain an adequate education, as children who are homeless face far more obstacles, such as increased health risks and lack of educational opportunities, than children who aren’t homeless. They are less likely to be able to contribute to society, as less than a quarter of homeless children graduate or receive well-paying jobs, making them trapped in a life of poverty. Child homelessness is the perfect portrait of poverty. Children are deprived of their basic needs – shelter, food, safety, and other resources – which are required for any individual to rise out a lifetime of poverty. In the United States, it is every individual’s human right to have their basic needs fulfilled; the government and the U.S. community need to ensure that those rights are being applied to all people in order to create a more flourishing and prosperous society.
In an effort to solve the problem of child homelessness, the U.S. government has implemented legislature to provide funding and support for services to the homeless, including provisions under the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001. However, it is not enough. To help homeless children overcome the obstacles of homelessness, such as poor healthcare and education, and put an end to child homelessness the United States government must actively ensure that the problem of child homelessness is being answered. By implementing and following through with the provisions in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, which increase the services and funding as included in the McKinney-Vento Act, the U.S. will be making greater strides towards ending homelessness all together. The legislature must also pass the HEARTH Act of 2009 as the reauthorization of the amendment of the McKinney-Vento Act and consider the Homeless Children and Youth Act of 2009 and other legislation...
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...ition for the Homeless. June 2008. 5 Apr. 2009 .
"Education Pays..." Bureau of Labor Statistics. 6 Mar. 2009. United States Department of Labor. 29 Apr. 2009 .
Hart-Shegos, Ellen. Homelessness and its Effect on Children. Ed. Anne Ray. Dec. 1999. Family Housing Fund. 5 Apr. 2009 . p. 4.
Homeless Youth. June 2008. National Coalition for the Homeless. 29 Apr. 2009. .
McKinney-Vento Act. National Coalition for the Homeless. June 2008. 6 Apr. 2009. .
McKinney-Vento Reauthorization. Apr. 2009. National Alliance to End Homelessness. 29 Apr. 2009 http://www.endhomelessness.org/section/policy/legislature/mckinney_vento>.
"Summary of the HEARTH Act, as Passed." Homeless Assistance Reauthorization: National Policy Update September 2008. 21 Oct. 2008. National Alliance to End Homelessness. 23 Feb. 2009 . Path: PDF File.
The thought of freedom seldom enters the mind of an American woman today. Currently women can vote, hold office, ascertain any profession (if she so desires), and even run for the presidency! Women have far outstepped the boundaries of obedient housewife, they have discarded the restraints of domestic duties and strived for a greater goal, a common objective - to be equal to, or greater than, their virile counterpart. In a world where the gender role is becoming increasingly less defined, where men become “mannies” or assume the position of “househusband,” it is easy to overlook the past. One simply forgets the plights of her ancestors, when embracing the copious liberties available to the modern woman.
In The Piano Lesson, written by August Wilson, Boy Willie devises a scheme for buying Sutter’s land. Boy Willie has one part of the money saved up. He will sell the watermelons for the second part. Then he will sell the piano for a third part. The only debating issue in Boy Willie’s scheme is the piano. Berniece does not want to sell the piano. This is the only reason for a defense in Boy Willie’s scheme. Therefore, I will defend Boy Willie’s issue of selling the piano and how that liberates him in reference to his scheme for buying Sutter’s land.
The books of A Lesson Before Dying, Song of Solomon, and The Piano Lesson are all classic tales of African American Literature. While written in assorted periods and by different authors, the lessons found in between the pages transcend time. They recount stories of injustice, perseverance, and success. Memory and the past play a critical role in understanding each character’s mindset. A Lesson Before Dying portrays the past as both a hindrance and a source of motivation. Song of Solomon exposes the belief that knowledge of the past is the key that unlocks the door to self discovery. The Piano Lesson introduces the idea that a person can turn painful memories into a source of motivation and pride. Although each book stresses different principles of how to handle the past, they agree that heritage awareness plays an important role in molding a healthier future.
The McKinney-Vento as amended by S. 896 the Homeless Emergency Assistance and Rapid Transition to Housing (HEARTH) Act of 2009 also known as McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, signed into law in 1987, covers many aspects of homelessness. The National Coalition for the Homeless states that the “McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act was the first—and remains the only—major federal legislative response to homelessness” (NCH). Originally, this act contained fifteen different programs that were included to aid the homeless population (United States Department of Housing and Urban Development [HUD], 2007). The goal of this act is help the homeless receive the services this population needs. This act also defined what is considered homeless by the United States Government. In this policy analysis, I have chosen to focus on Title VII-B of the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act. Title VII-B addresses homeless children and their rights to equal access to an education. The goal of this Title is to meet the needs of the children who meet the definition of homeless.
Do you ever have one of those days when you remember your parents taking away all of your baseball cards or all of your comic books because you got a bad grade in one of your classes? You feel a little depressed and your priced possession has been stolen. This event is the same as August Wilson’s, The Piano Lesson. The story is about a sibling rivalry, Boy Willie Charles against Berniece Charles, regarding an antique, family inherited piano. Boy Willie wants to sell the piano in order to buy the same Mississippi land that his family had worked as slaves. However, Berniece, who has the piano, declines Boy Willie’s request to sell the piano because it is a reminder of the history that is their family heritage. She believes that the piano is more consequential than “hard cash” Boy Willie wants. Based on this idea, one might consider that Berniece is more ethical than Boy Willie.
Homelessness is primarily a poverty issue. The persistence of poverty in the United States reflects more than just an aggregation of individual failings. Structural factors, such as the way we understand and define poverty, the inherent features of our economic system that produce income inequality, social inequities and our policy responses to these problems shape current trends. Economic changes have had the strongest association with trends in overall rates, regardless of how poverty is measured. Poverty rate is high amongst minority groups, children and female-headed households (Iceland, 2003). According to professor Iceland’s research, rates of extreme poverty are higher among children and African-Americans and lower for whites, Asians and the elderly. Among families with children, married couples were less likely to be poor (6.9 %) than single parent male (17.5%) and single parent female (35.3%).
To enforce the central subject of conflict between siblings: Boy Willie and Berniece over their family piano, the 1995 film adaptation of The Piano Lesson (PL) successfully recreates two important parts of stage-play. The first occurs in Act 1, Scene 2. This scene is important because it outlines the history of the piano, as well as Berniece’s emotional attachment to the piano, and the involvement of Sutter’s ghost. Knowing the history behind the piano is essential to the viewer's comprehension of its symbolic significance. The central subject is enforced through this scene because it provides the motive of the conflict. Boy Willie sees the piano as a monetary item and a way to advance his social and economic security. That by selling the piano and buying Sutter’s land, he would be an heir to his father’s legacy. To Berniece, the piano holds an emotional and symbolic value that no amount of money could equal. She sees the life and death of her and Boy Willie’s father as well as the blood, tears and sacred spirit
As a result of anti-poverty legislation being placed into effect all over the country to force workers back into the capitalist labour market, which has taken hold in neoliberalism, the number of families finding themselves on the brink of homeless is skyrocketing. Furthermore, with the reduction of social assistance programs these families are barely able to provide for themselves, therefore, numerous children are being physically impacted by homelessness. According to Jenny Hsu (2015) hunger and physical illness are effects children and youth may experience due to homelessness that greatly affect their development which is unacceptable for our government to allow this many young people to be negatively impacted. Thus, the links between these
August Wilson’s The Piano Lesson, tells a story of a family haunted by the pain of their past and their struggle to find peace to move forward. The story begins with character Boy Willie coming up from the south visiting his sister Bernice. Boy Willie introduces the idea of selling the family’s heirloom, a piano, to raise enough money to buy the land on which his ancestors were enslaved. However, both Boy Willie and his sister Berniece own half a half of the piano and she refuses to let Boy Willie sell it. Through the use of symbolism, Wilson uses his characters, the piano and the family’s situation to provide his intended audience with the lesson of exorcising our past in order to move forward in our lives. Our past will always be a part of our lives, but it does not limit or determine where we can go, what we can do, or who we can become.
Surprisingly, this novel ends with Boy Willie and Lymon going back to Mississippi without selling the piano. Finally, Boy Willie closes by telling Berniece that if she doesn’t keep playing on the piano, he and Sutter would both be back. In saying this, Boy Willie means that if they don’t keep their inheritance close to their heart, unfavorable events could begin happening once
The Piano Lesson written by August Wilson is a work that struggles to suggest how best African Americans can handle their heritage and how they can best put their history to use. This problem is important to the development of theme throughout the work and is fueled by the two key players of the drama: Berniece and Boy Willie. These siblings, who begin with opposing views on what to do with a precious family heirloom, although both protagonists in the drama, serve akin to foils of one another. Their similarities and differences help the audience to understand each individual more fully and to comprehend the theme that one must find balance between deserting and preserving the past in order to pursue the future, that both too greatly honoring or too greatly guarding the past can ruin opportunities in the present and the future.
Family homelessness is a fairly new social problem in America. Beginning in the early 1980’s, families with children have become the fastest growing segment of the homeless population.
The Piano Lesson by August Wilson is taking place in Pittsburg because many Blacks travelled North to escape poverty and racial judgment in the South. This rapid mass movement in history is known as The Great migration. The migration meant African Americans are leaving behind what had always been their economic and social base in America, and having to find a new one. The main characters in this play are Berniece and Boy Willie who are siblings fighting over a piano that they value in different ways. Berniece wants to have it for sentimental reasons, while Boy Willie wants it so he can sell it and buy land. The piano teaches many lessons about the effects of separation, migration, and the reunion of
In The Piano Lesson each central character learns a lesson. August Wilson uses plenty of symbolism throughout his play, the strongest symbol being the piano itself, representing the family's history, their long struggle, and their burden of their race. Throughout the play, the conflict revolves around the piano, and Berniece and Boy Willie's contrasting views about its significance and about what should be done with it. Berniece is ashamed and cannot let go of the past, or the piano, and Boy Willie wants to move his life forward, and use the piano to do so. Wilson portrays the 'lesson' of the piano as accepting and respecting one's past and moving on with one's life gracefully, through Berniece and Boy Willies contrasting actions and the play's climactic resolution.
William Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice presents a battle between love and hate, influenced by money. Written during the 16th Century, Shakespeare depicts an anti-Semitic era through the eyes of both Jews and Christians. Each perspective has it’s struggles, but what stays consistent between them is what makes this play so historical. Throughout this play, it becomes clear that culture affected by love and hatred, under the influence of money, can deliver a powerful message that still speaks to readers today.