Increasingly since 2000, definitions of Australian Indigenous homelessness in the social science literature have become culturally specific. Pathways into homelessness for contemporary Indigenous Australians can involve longitudinal factors, including those having an impact from early childhood in Indigenous settlements and communities that have institutionalised and marginalised histories. They can also involve situational factors acting upon the lives of certain individuals, but which also arise from colonial contact histories and directed cultural change. To comprehend the definitions and pathways into homelessness some understanding of the cultural and historical backgrounds of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples is necessary.

This article is from the Parity - November 2010 Homelessness and Dispossession