In this rich cultural history, Pamela Roberston Wojcik examines America's ambivalent and shifting attitude toward homelessness through a close study of film cycles from five distinct historical moments that show characters as unhomed and placeless, mobile rather than fixed-characters who fail, resist, or opt out of the mandate for a home of one's own. From the tramp films of the silent era to 2021's Oscar-winning
Nomadland, Wojcik reveals a tension in the American imaginary between viewing homelessness as, on the one hand, deviant or threatening, and, on the other, emblematic of freedom and independence. Blending social history with insights drawn from a complex array of films, both canonical and fringe, Wojcik effectively "unhomes" dominant narratives that cast aspirations for success and social mobility as the focus of American cinema, reminding us that genres of precarity have been central to American cinema (and the American story) all along.
About the AuthorPamela Robertson Wojcik is Professor of Film, Television, and Theatre and Concurrent in Gender Studies and American Studies at the University of Notre Dame. She is the author of several works of film and cultural studies, including
Fantasies of Neglect: Imagining the Urban Child in American Film and Fiction and
The Apartment Plot: Urban Living in American Film and Popular Culture, 1945 to 1975.
Book InformationISBN 9780520390355
Author Pamela Robertson WojcikFormat Hardback
Page Count 296
Imprint University of California PressPublisher University of California Press