MaryGrace Trifilio

MARYGRACE TRIFILIO, then a graduate student at University of Minnesota, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota, was awarded a grant in September 2023 to aid research on “Homebound: The Carcerality of Eldercare for Queer Seniors in Brooklyn, NY,” supervised by Dr. Karen-Sue Taussig. This ethnography examines the experience of aging in place in Brooklyn, New York, and how federal, state, and local policies on eldercare and urban development shape that experience. How and why is aging in place informed by: 1) political economies of care; and 2) the logics of the medical-carceral complex? That is: 1) Who cares for whom and why? 2) Why are eldercare options seemingly punitive forms of abandonment? The reputation and seeming raison d’etre of New York City stands in stark contrast with the ethos of aging in place, making Brooklyn a critical site for this study. Preliminary findings suggest that there is a degree to which abandonment is expected and thus accepted. Seniors expressed that abandonment was inevitable and unavoidable — not just abandonment by housing officials and politicians, but also by kin. Elders and advocates alike point to the diminished economic productivity of senior citizens as the reasoning behind their abandonment.