homeless

American  

[hohm-lis] / ˈhoʊm lɪs /

adjective

1. without a home or without permanent housing.

   a homeless refugee.

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noun

(used with a plural verb)

1. Sometimes Disparaging and Offensive.  Usually the homeless people who lack permanent housing or a fixed residence, collectively.

homeless British  

/ ˈhəʊmlɪs /

adjective

1. 1. having nowhere to live

   2. ( as collective noun; preceded by the )

      the homeless

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Sensitive Note

There are a number of words used to label people who don’t have permanent housing. While the term homeless was used without controversy for some time, advocates for this population, many style guides, and some people who identify as members of this group now prefer other terms including unhoused, houseless, and unsheltered. The alternative terms to homeless each have a specific nuance of meaning. Unsheltered, for example, includes people who sleep in cars and under overpasses, but not people in temporary housing like city shelters. Houseless and unhoused both mean that a person lacks permanent housing, but may still be a member of a community that they call home, in which case the designation homeless is imprecise. Further, someone’s homeless status is often temporary, as expressed in the phrases “people moving through houselessness,” “people experiencing homelessness,” and “unsheltered people.” Nevertheless, the term homeless is easily understood and even preferred as a term of self-identification by many members of this community. The designation homeless is still widely used and only sometimes offensive or disparaging. However, one should be mindful of the negative connotation this word may have and the many unfortunate associations it has had with poverty, mental illness, substance abuse, or crime. The word should not be used as a euphemism for these other statuses and stigmatized conditions. Homeless should be used only in the strict denotative meaning, and alternative expressions that put the person first, like “an individual experiencing homelessness,” are often preferable.

Other Word Forms

• homelessly adverb
• homelessness noun

Etymology

Origin of homeless

First recorded before 1000; home ( def. ) + -less ( def. )

Example Sentences

A homeless charity has said the number of people accessing its services is the highest it has ever been.

From BBC

The losses and damage are the worst in Sri Lanka since the devastating 2004 Asian tsunami that killed around 31,000 people there and left more than a million homeless.

From Barron's

About a third of students at the school are homeless.

From Los Angeles Times

Ng’s daughter and her family, now homeless, are staying with her.

From The Wall Street Journal

A third of care leavers become homeless within the first two years of leaving care.

From BBC

Related Words

• houseless
• unhoused
• unsheltered