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Housing Inequality in America

Bio: Katie Cline

I am a Ph.D. student in American Culture Studies at Bowling Green State University (approximate graduation Spring 2026). My research interests broadly include gender representation in young adult literature, TV, and popular music. My previous research has explored the gendered relationship between cats and women in Harry Potter, the depiction of female characters in Jim Kay's illustrated Harry Potter books, Hilda Spellman’s domesticity as a source of power in Netflix’s Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (2018-2020), and the significance of driving allusions in the music of Taylor Swift.

Feel free to view some of my past work below:

"Recoding It All Too Well: Swifties, Parasocial Relationships, and the Scarf that Broke the Internet" (YASA 2022)
"'I'll drive': Freedom and Driving in the Lyrics of Taylor Swift" (PCA/ACA 2022)
"Hilda Spellman's Empowering Domesticity in Netflix's Chilling Adventures of Sabrina" (YASA 2020)
"The Bigger Picture: The Representation of Female Characters in Jim Kay's Illustrated Harry Potter Books" (ChLA 2021)
"The Bigger Picture" was also published in the Winter 2020 issue of the Journal of Fantasy and Fan Cultures. You can view the full article for free here.

I completed my M.A. in English with a concentration in Children’s Literature at Kansas State University in May 2020 and hold a B.A. in English (‘18) from Jacksonville State University (Jacksonville, AL). My 3 cats–Toothless, Minnie, and Beanie–say hi!

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1. Pets & Housing: It's "Ruff" - Introduction In 2022, over 70% of U.S. households own a pet , which means that 7 in 10 families take their pets into consideration when moving, buying or renting a home, or otherwise arranging their living situations. The following pages will explore 3 topics surrounding housing and pet ownership—inequalities surrounding how a pet owner’s race and/or age affect their access to quality housing; emotional support animals and their hotly-contended place in the rental market; and homelessness and pet ownership.
3. Emotional Support Animals & Mental Health “ESAs are protected by law, but critics argue the system is being exploited by pet owners without genuine mental health problems.” These opening lines from a 2019 report by the British newspaper The Guardian about the emotional support animal (ESA) “epidemic” in America succinctly summarizes the conflict at the center of a rising debate about the prevalence of mental illness among pet owners. This page explores the benefits that owning a pet can have for a person's mental health as well as the barriers pet ownership creates for finding housing for those with mental health problems.
4. Pets & Homelessness In the United States, over 552,000 people experience homelessness on any given night, and, of those, up to 25% own a pet. With the social benefits of pet ownership, people experiencing homelessness also face increased vulnerability: losing one’s pet prematurely to death or rehoming could lead to mental health crises, and pet ownership was often viewed as a barrier to health and social services, housing access, and employment opportunities.
5. Pets & Housing: It's "Ruff" - Conclusion Animals are a heavily integrated into human’s lives as companions, service animals (like guide dogs and medical assistance dogs), and more general assistance animals regardless of gender, race, socioeconomic class, or housing situation. What many people do not realize, unless they experience it firsthand, is the ways in which our relationship to pets can affect our access to housing opportunities.

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HS: Katie Cline
Katie's Cats (for Bio) A collage of three cats on a plum purple background with tan and pink polka dots. The quote says, "Three cats is a cat lady," and it is attributed to Taylor Swift. From left to right, the cats pictured are Toothless (a black at laying on his side with 3 glittery gold Christmas ornaments beside him), Minnie (a fat brown tabby cat wearing a purple flower Halloween costume around her neck while sitting on a light pink bed spread), and Beanie (a tortoiseshell kitten laying on her side on the top round platform of a taupe colored cat tree; she is small enough to fit on the platform with room to spare)