Understanding cultural aspects of health through photography.

Photography is used as a means to teach nursing students of varying learning styles and levels of cultural awareness about cultural aspects of health.

Extending the extended family for homeless and marginally housed African American women.

Young homeless African American women and elderly marginally housed African American women have health, housing, and personal concerns specific to their age cohort, yet they also have parallel and complementary needs. The young struggle to find affordable housing, while the old may have difficulty in maintaining their homes. This article reports select findings from a pilot study designed to describe these two groups of women. The preliminary study was conducted preparatory to the development of a larger study to explore factors that would facilitate or hinder linking the two groups of women for mutual assistance in housesharing arrangements. Interviews and housing history findings revealed contrasts and similarities among the women and between both cohorts that reflected individual differences, common yet divergent life courses, and collective responses to family life situations, societal trends, and policies. Advantages and disadvantages of housesharing were delineated with 56.3% of the homeless women and 81.3% of the elderly women viewing coresidential living as an option worth considering. Housesharing arrangements should be further investigated by nurses and colleagues. Findings from this study are foundational for establishing alliances that may be a means to promote health and strengthen "family" in both populations.

Linking African American mothers across life stage and station through photovoice.

Homeless young African American women and low-income, elderly African American women have housing needs specific to their age cohorts, yet they also have parallel and complementary housing, health, and personal needs. The young struggle to afford decent housing, while the old may have difficulty maintaining their homes. In this pilot study, intergenerational contact was established between young homeless women and elderly independently housed women through photovoice. Over six months, five African American women discussed photographs they had taken that focused on their current living arrangements and activities. Although the women spanned three generations, had different life experiences, and resided in a variety of home settings, the sharing of photographs revealed many commonalities. In the process of discussing photographs, the women established mutual respect, exercised reciprocal affirmation, and built alliances. The preliminary study is preparatory to exploring the feasibility of establishing house-sharing arrangements for mutual assistance between these cohorts.

Poverty and procreation among women. An anthropologic study with implications for health care providers.

In this article, select findings from a 5-year ethnographic study of homeless, pregnant women in Southern California pin-pointed the contextual constraints, along with individual factors, that framed the women's reproductive options and actions. The women had very little choice in the timing, the place, the partner, and the circumstances surrounding conception. Factors contributing to their becoming pregnant were the woman's victimization, economic survival, lack of access to contraceptives, uncertain fertility, desire for intimacy, and hope for the future. Findings suggest that even if the women were able to establish reproductive goals and had the wherewithal to acquire and effectively use contraceptives, situational constraints (homelessness, pregnancy, poverty, contraception, fertility patterns) might still prevent their success.

PIP: This 5-year ethnographic study describes the ability of 15 women living in Southern California to manage their reproductive goals while they were homeless. Data were collected through participant observation spanning a few months to 1 year; from information offered by scores of other homeless, pregnant women; from interviews with ancillary people in the lives of the subjects; and from focused observations of the environment and resources offered by the community. This report focuses on the circumstances that led the women to become pregnant. It was found that conception usually occurred in less then desirable conditions and that the women had little choice in the timing and place of conception or in selection of their partner. Most of the women became pregnant while homeless and attributed this to a desire for intimacy, to victimization, to a bid for economic survival, to a lack of access to contraceptives, to uncertainty about their fertility, and to a hope for the future that made being pregnant their sole source of joy. It is concluded that it is unjust that society expects impoverished women with few resources to be more able to control their reproductive lives than women with more resources, especially since preventing pregnancy requires consistent, diligent use of the most effective methods of contraception. Further study of this situation is needed.

Special health care needs of homeless pregnant women.

As women and families join the ranks of the homeless in increasing numbers, many women find themselves confronting both pregnancy and homelessness. When pregnancy accompanies the precarious state of homelessness, the need for adequate shelter is not being met during one of the most critical periods of a woman's life. This article focuses on the unique health needs of homeless pregnant women. Detailed accounts of the daily life experiences of African American, Anglo, and Latina homeless pregnant women were derived from an ethnographic study conducted in a large metropolitan area in southern California. Their pregnancies were difficult because normal physiological changes of pregnancy often became pathological, signs of potential complications went unnoticed or unattended, and minor discomforts of pregnancy were exacerbated by the women's environment. Nursing therapeutics that support health maintenance and coping strategies of the women while on the streets or in shelters were explicated.

Self-perceptions and personal sources of support among Creole Belizean parents of mentally retarded children.

A modified version of the Kuhn-McPartland Twenty-Statement Test, a projective technique to measure self attitudes, was administered to six Creole Belizean mothers of mentally retarded children in Belize, Central America. Other methods of measurement included participant observation over a 13-month period, focused observations, formal, unstructured interviews, and daily calendars maintained by the parents. A central finding of the entire ethnographic study was that mothers relied almost exclusively on themselves and personal sources of support, like religion, for coping, rather than social support from others.