Honor Killing: Overview

Honor killings refer to the practice of murder committed within families or social groups to preserve or restore perceived honor, often involving women who are believed to have transgressed cultural norms. Such killings frequently arise from issues related to sexual behavior, including refusal to enter arranged marriages or engaging in relationships deemed inappropriate. The phenomenon is not confined to any single culture or religion; it has been documented across various countries, including those in the Middle East, South Asia, Europe, and North America. Although frequently associated with Muslim communities, honor killings also occur in conservative Hindu and Christian contexts. The motivations behind these acts can be deeply rooted in patriarchal traditions, where control over female behavior is viewed as integral to family honor. Legal responses vary significantly, with some nations recognizing and sanctioning such practices, while others classify them as homicide under general laws. Activists and scholars continue to debate whether honor killings should be treated as a unique category of crime, with opinions divided on whether this approach might reinforce cultural stereotypes or aid in better addressing the issue. The complexity of honor killings reflects broader societal tensions regarding gender, culture, and family dynamics.

Full Article

Introduction

The term “honor killings” refers to murders committed within a family or other social group for the purpose of maintaining family or group honor. Most of the murders law enforcement currently classifies as honor killings are cases in which women from conservative cultural groups were killed by family members for their perceived failure to live in accordance with the norms and values of the group. Honor killing of women is often related to sexual behavior, and many cases occur when women refuse to engage in arranged or forced marriages or if they engage in sexual behavior that violates accepted cultural norms.

In the case of some honor killings in Europe and North America, victims have been killed for taking on Western behaviors that are seen as violations of traditional moral and behavioral codes, including adopting Western dress, listening to Western music, or having a romantic affiliation with members of other ethnic or cultural groups. In some cases, individuals have been the victims of honor-based violence for displaying homosexual behavior or gender nonconformity. In Europe and North America, most known honor killings have been connected with Muslim immigrant groups, prompting the misconception among some that the practice is condoned by Islam. The practice of honor killing has also been connected to conservative Hindu and Christian communities.

Some argue that honor killings are a distinct type of homicide and that police and judicial authorities must develop specific strategies for prosecution, investigation, and prevention to address the issue. Some also support specific training programs to help police and social service groups to understand issues of motivation for honor-based violence. Despite the unique motivations involved, some argue that honor killings should not be treated differently than any other form of murder, with perpetrators subject to the same laws and penalties that govern homicide laws. In addition, some object to the use of the term “honor killing” because it carries social connotations that can lead to religious or cultural persecution.

Understanding the Discussion

Chastity: Abstention from sexual activity or discourse, or behavior in keeping with the sexual laws and rules of a society, family, or social group.

Honor: Perceived level of respectability, worthiness, or esteem with regard to a person, family, or certain group within the larger context of a society or more intimate social group.

Patriarchy: A type of social group in which men are the designated leaders and authority is passed through male members of the group or family.

Premeditated murder: A category of crime defined as causing the death of another individual with planning either in the method used to commit the murder or in steps taken to conceal the crime.

Social norms: Rules of behavior and conduct that govern a certain society or subgroup of society.

Vengeance: Infliction of bodily harm against another individual in retribution for actual or perceived harm received as a result of that individual's actions or behaviors.

Virginity: The state of a person who has not engaged in sexual intercourse or other sexual behavior seen as violating the state of virginity within a certain cultural or social context.

History

Murders motivated by the desire to defend or protect family or group honor, or to seek vengeance against those who dishonor the social or cultural group, occur in a number of countries. These have included Yemen, Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, Morocco, Israel, Egypt, China, Turkey, Brazil, Ecuador, Italy, Great Britain, Canada, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Sweden, Syria, Uganda, and the United States. The global breadth of incidents and the variety of cultural groups involved in honor-based murders and other crimes indicate that honor killing is global in scope and not restricted to a certain ethnic, religious, cultural, or social group.

Historians have traced the origin of honor killing to ancient patriarchal traditions found around the world, wherein female members of the society were often legally regarded as the property of the male members of an extended family group. The practice of honor killing is intimately tied to legal and cultural precedents granting a man the right to protect personal or family honor by punishing or executing his wife or children for adultery or the violation of sexual norms.

The Code of Assura, from the ancient Assyrian culture, for instance, contains provisions stating that a woman's chastity and virginity are the property of her family. In Assyrian culture, women were traded as property between families, and the virginity of the woman was considered a part of her “value” in trade. An individual involved in taking the virginity of a woman was therefore subject to legal penalties or retribution from the leader of the family. Further, a man was permitted to kill a woman in his family suspected of behaving in ways that violated her chastity or sexual propriety. Similarly, during the Qing dynasty of China, from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century, fathers were legally permitted to kill daughters seen as having violated family honor. Similar statutes existed in the ancient Inca and Aztec civilizations of the New World.

According to legal scholar Matthew A. Goldstein, in his 2002 article “The Biological Roots of Heat-of-Passion Crimes and Honor Killings,” the Hebrew Bible books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy sanction the use of a death sentence as punishment for adultery, while similar punishments are mentioned in the New Testament. Activist Rana Husseini has noted that women could be legally killed for adultery throughout medieval Christian Europe and into the nineteenth century, affecting even Anne Boleyn, one of the wives of English king Henry VIII. While death sentences for adultery are not explicitly condoned in the Qur'an, honor killings were committed in a variety of ancient Islamic cultures.

In most cases, women have been the primary victims of honor killings and the perpetrators are generally male members of the victim's family. Honor killings typically involve careful planning and explicit threats leading up to the murder and often involve participation by members of the extended family either in perpetrating or concealing evidence of the murder. However, honor killings, or honor-based violence, may occasionally occur in other situations, including murder or violence against individuals suspected of engaging in homosexual behavior. This category of crime has been identified most notably in Brazil and Argentina, where prohibitions against homosexual behavior are more pronounced than in Europe and North America. Trans women have also been the victims of gender-based violence.

In the United States and Canada, high-profile honor killing cases prompted a debate over the relationship between honor killing and Islamic culture. According to a 2009 article in the Middle East Quarterly, over 90 percent of honor killings in Europe and the United States were being committed by Muslims against other Muslims. While cultural motivations appear to be the major factor motivating instances of honor killing, religious affiliation also plays an important role in many cases. For instance, in 2010, Gonay Ogmen was convicted in Turkey for murdering his sister and her husband, reportedly because the sister's husband was Muslim, while the family was Christian. Support for honor killing may go hand in hand with support for government enforcing sharia (Islamic religious law): a 2013 Pew Research Center survey found that 89 percent of Muslims in Pakistan who favor implementing sharia as the law of the land also supported the stoning of people who had committed adultery. They were joined by 85 percent of such respondents in Afghanistan, 84 percent in Palestine, 81 percent in Egypt, and 67 percent in Jordan.

While most countries prohibit honor killings under laws governing more general instances of murder, the practice is socially condoned in a number of modern cultures and is legally sanctioned in some nations. Syria legally sanctioned the murder of any female family member for inappropriate sexual acts until 2009, when new legislation passed prohibiting honor-based violence. In Syria, Iraq, and Iran, defending family honor was considered a mitigating circumstance and perpetrators were subject to reduced sentences, though honor killings were still classified as murder under Iraqi, Iranian, and Syrian laws. In some countries, such as Jordan and Yemen, the government could place those at risk of being killed or harmed in acts of honor-based violence in indefinite administrative detention—in other words, imprison them. Jordan ended that practice in 2018 and instead began sending such individuals to a safe house.

An increasing number of honor killings have taken in places such as Iran in the first decades of the twenty-first century. Professor Fariba Parsa noted in 2021 that social changes that had increased Iranian women's literacy and awareness of their legal rights while men's cultural mindsets have not necessarily shifted. (Though most honor killings are committed by men, women have also been indicted for committing honor killings.)

One of the countries most associated with honor killings remains Pakistan. Amnesty International reported in 2010 that more than 647 women were the victims of honor killings in Pakistan in 2009, making Pakistan the country with the highest number of reported honor killings at the time. In 2016, the murder of Pakistani model Qandeel Baloch drew international attention to honor killings; Baloch was murdered by her brother, who perceived her fame and social media presence to have brought shame to his family. Following Qandeel's death, Pakistani lawmakers passed the Anti-Honor Killing Act, which prohibits pardons when a victim's family members forgive the perpetrator and instead sentences convicted murders in honor killing cases to lifetime imprisonment. Enforcement of that law has not been consistent, however, and Human Rights Watch reported in 2019 that an estimated one thousand Pakistani women die in honor killings each year.

Honor Killings Today

Quantifying the scale of honor killings is difficult. The number of countries reporting data on intimate partner and family-related femicides decreased from seventy-five countries in 2020 to only thirty-seven countries in 2023. The United Nations reported in 2024 that 51,100 women had died at the hands of intimate partners or relatives in 2023 alone; of those, a subset were killed in honor-based crimes. In some cases, police fail to identify a murder as an honor killing because family and extended members of the community aid the primary perpetrators in concealing the crime.

Some scholars and members of Islamic communities have objected to the use of the term “honor killing,” claiming that this term has become politicized by those in North America and Europe who seek to persecute members of Islamic communities. Legal authorities in the United States, Canada, and Europe have debated whether honor killing should be classified as a distinct category of crime for the purposes of investigation and prosecution. Some argue that separating honor killings from other instances of murder heightens cultural prejudice and fear, and that honor killings should therefore be treated as instances of premeditated murder and should be subject to existing laws and penalties.

These essays and any opinions, information, or representations contained therein are the creation of the particular author and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of EBSCO Information Services.


Bibliography

Ali, Ayaan Hirsi. “Honor Killings in America.” The Atlantic, 30 Apr. 2015, www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/04/honor-killings-in-america/391760/. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Caffaro, Federica, et al. “Gender Differences in the Perception of Honour Killings in Individualist versus Collectivist Cultures: Comparison between Italy and Turkey.” Sex Roles, vol. 71, nos. 9–10, 2014, pp. 296–318.

Chesler, Phyllis. “When Women Commit Honor Killings.” Middle East Quarterly, vol. 22, no. 4, 2015, pp. 1–12.

Chesler, Phyllis, and Nathan Bloom. “Hindu vs. Muslim Honor Killings.” Middle East Quarterly, vol. 19, no. 3, 2012, pp. 43–52.

Dogan, Recep. “Did the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 Get It Right? Are All Honour Killings Revenge Killings?” Punishment & Society, vol. 15, no. 5, 2013, pp. 488–514.

Dogan, Recep. “Different Cultural Understandings of Honor That Inspire Killing: An Inquiry into the Defendant’s Perspective.” Homicide Studies, vol. 18, no. 4, 2014, pp. 363–88.

“Five Essential Facts to Know about Femicide.” UN Women, 25 Nov. 2024, www.unwomen.org/en/articles/explainer/five-essential-facts-to-know-about-femicide. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Gill, Aisha K., and Avtar Brah. “Interrogating Cultural Narratives about 'Honour'-Based Violence.” European Journal of Women's Studies, vol. 21, no. 1, 2014, pp. 72–86.

Husseini, Rana. “The Historical and Religious Seeds of 'Honor.'” Abraham's Children: Liberty and Tolerance in an Age of Religious Conflict, edited by Kelly James Clark, Yale UP, 2012.

Husseini, Rana. “Murdered Women: A History of ‘Honour’ Crimes.” Al Jazeera, Aug. 2021, www.aljazeera.com/features/2021/8/1/murdered-women-a-history-of-honour-crimes. Accessed 6 June 2025.

“International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women 25 November.” United Nations, 25 Nov. 2024, www.un.org/en/observances/ending-violence-against-women-day. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Kinnear, Karen L. Women in Developing Countries: A Reference Handbook. ABC-Clio, 2011.

Muhammad, Niaz, et al. “Honor Killing in Pakistan: An Islamic Perspective.” Asian Social Science, vol. 8, no. 10, 2012, pp. 180–85.

Muise, Monique. “Shafia Verdict Sparks Debate: Was It an Honor Killing, or Just Plain Murder?” Gazette, 30 Jan. 2012, gazette.com.

Olwan, Dana M. “Gendered Violence, Cultural Otherness, and Honour Crimes in Canadian National Logics.” Canadian Journal of Sociology, vol. 38, no. 4, 2013, pp. 533–55.

“One Woman Killed Every 10 Minutes: The Harrowing Global Reality of Femicide.” United Nations, 25 Nov. 2024, news.un.org/en/story/2024/11/1157386. Accessed 6 June 2025.

“Pakistani Model Qandeel Baloch Killed by Brother after Friends' Taunts.” The Guardian, 27 July 2016, www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jul/28/pakistani-model-qandeel-baloch-killed-by-brother-after-friends-taunts-mother. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Parsa, Fariba. “Iranian Women Campaign to Stop the Rise in ‘Honor Killings.’” Middle East Institute, 26 Aug. 2021, www.mei.edu/publications/iranian-women-campaign-stop-rise-honor-killings. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Pew Research Center. The World's Muslims: Religion, Politics and Society, 30 Apr. 2013, www.pewresearch.org/religion/wp-content/uploads/sites/7/2013/04/worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-full-report.pdf. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Prochazka, Susanne J. “There Is No Honor in Honor Killings: Why Women at Risk for Defying Sociosexual Norms Must Be Considered a ‘Particular Social Group’ Under Asylum Law.” Thomas Jefferson Law Review, vol. 34, no. 2, 2012, pp. 445–503.

Rubin, Alissa J. “A Thin Line of Defense against ‘Honor Killings.’” The New York Times, 2 Mar. 2015, www.nytimes.com/2015/03/03/world/asia/afghanistan-a-thin-line-of-defense-against-honor-killings.html. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Suleman Anees, Mariyam. “‘Honor Killings’ Continue Unabated in Pakistan.” The Diplomat, 28 July 2022, thediplomat.com/2022/07/honor-killings-continue-unabated-in-pakistan/. Accessed 6 June 2025.

“Thousands of Honor Attacks in Britain Last Year.” Telegraph, 3 Dec. 2011, www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/8932926/Thousands-of-honour-attacks-in-Britain-last-year.html. Accessed 6 June 2025.

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Killings of Women and Girls by Their Intimate Partner or Other Family Members. Nov. 2021, www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/statistics/crime/UN_BriefFem_251121.pdf. Accessed 6 June 2025.

‌

Full Article

Introduction

The term “honor killings” refers to murders committed within a family or other social group for the purpose of maintaining family or group honor. Most of the murders law enforcement currently classifies as honor killings are cases in which women from conservative cultural groups were killed by family members for their perceived failure to live in accordance with the norms and values of the group. Honor killing of women is often related to sexual behavior, and many cases occur when women refuse to engage in arranged or forced marriages or if they engage in sexual behavior that violates accepted cultural norms.

In the case of some honor killings in Europe and North America, victims have been killed for taking on Western behaviors that are seen as violations of traditional moral and behavioral codes, including adopting Western dress, listening to Western music, or having a romantic affiliation with members of other ethnic or cultural groups. In some cases, individuals have been the victims of honor-based violence for displaying homosexual behavior or gender nonconformity. In Europe and North America, most known honor killings have been connected with Muslim immigrant groups, prompting the misconception among some that the practice is condoned by Islam. The practice of honor killing has also been connected to conservative Hindu and Christian communities.

Some argue that honor killings are a distinct type of homicide and that police and judicial authorities must develop specific strategies for prosecution, investigation, and prevention to address the issue. Some also support specific training programs to help police and social service groups to understand issues of motivation for honor-based violence. Despite the unique motivations involved, some argue that honor killings should not be treated differently than any other form of murder, with perpetrators subject to the same laws and penalties that govern homicide laws. In addition, some object to the use of the term “honor killing” because it carries social connotations that can lead to religious or cultural persecution.

Understanding the Discussion

Chastity: Abstention from sexual activity or discourse, or behavior in keeping with the sexual laws and rules of a society, family, or social group.

Honor: Perceived level of respectability, worthiness, or esteem with regard to a person, family, or certain group within the larger context of a society or more intimate social group.

Patriarchy: A type of social group in which men are the designated leaders and authority is passed through male members of the group or family.

Premeditated murder: A category of crime defined as causing the death of another individual with planning either in the method used to commit the murder or in steps taken to conceal the crime.

Social norms: Rules of behavior and conduct that govern a certain society or subgroup of society.

Vengeance: Infliction of bodily harm against another individual in retribution for actual or perceived harm received as a result of that individual's actions or behaviors.

Virginity: The state of a person who has not engaged in sexual intercourse or other sexual behavior seen as violating the state of virginity within a certain cultural or social context.

History

Murders motivated by the desire to defend or protect family or group honor, or to seek vengeance against those who dishonor the social or cultural group, occur in a number of countries. These have included Yemen, Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, Morocco, Israel, Egypt, China, Turkey, Brazil, Ecuador, Italy, Great Britain, Canada, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Sweden, Syria, Uganda, and the United States. The global breadth of incidents and the variety of cultural groups involved in honor-based murders and other crimes indicate that honor killing is global in scope and not restricted to a certain ethnic, religious, cultural, or social group.

Historians have traced the origin of honor killing to ancient patriarchal traditions found around the world, wherein female members of the society were often legally regarded as the property of the male members of an extended family group. The practice of honor killing is intimately tied to legal and cultural precedents granting a man the right to protect personal or family honor by punishing or executing his wife or children for adultery or the violation of sexual norms.

The Code of Assura, from the ancient Assyrian culture, for instance, contains provisions stating that a woman's chastity and virginity are the property of her family. In Assyrian culture, women were traded as property between families, and the virginity of the woman was considered a part of her “value” in trade. An individual involved in taking the virginity of a woman was therefore subject to legal penalties or retribution from the leader of the family. Further, a man was permitted to kill a woman in his family suspected of behaving in ways that violated her chastity or sexual propriety. Similarly, during the Qing dynasty of China, from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century, fathers were legally permitted to kill daughters seen as having violated family honor. Similar statutes existed in the ancient Inca and Aztec civilizations of the New World.

According to legal scholar Matthew A. Goldstein, in his 2002 article “The Biological Roots of Heat-of-Passion Crimes and Honor Killings,” the Hebrew Bible books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy sanction the use of a death sentence as punishment for adultery, while similar punishments are mentioned in the New Testament. Activist Rana Husseini has noted that women could be legally killed for adultery throughout medieval Christian Europe and into the nineteenth century, affecting even Anne Boleyn, one of the wives of English king Henry VIII. While death sentences for adultery are not explicitly condoned in the Qur'an, honor killings were committed in a variety of ancient Islamic cultures.

In most cases, women have been the primary victims of honor killings and the perpetrators are generally male members of the victim's family. Honor killings typically involve careful planning and explicit threats leading up to the murder and often involve participation by members of the extended family either in perpetrating or concealing evidence of the murder. However, honor killings, or honor-based violence, may occasionally occur in other situations, including murder or violence against individuals suspected of engaging in homosexual behavior. This category of crime has been identified most notably in Brazil and Argentina, where prohibitions against homosexual behavior are more pronounced than in Europe and North America. Trans women have also been the victims of gender-based violence.

In the United States and Canada, high-profile honor killing cases prompted a debate over the relationship between honor killing and Islamic culture. According to a 2009 article in the Middle East Quarterly, over 90 percent of honor killings in Europe and the United States were being committed by Muslims against other Muslims. While cultural motivations appear to be the major factor motivating instances of honor killing, religious affiliation also plays an important role in many cases. For instance, in 2010, Gonay Ogmen was convicted in Turkey for murdering his sister and her husband, reportedly because the sister's husband was Muslim, while the family was Christian. Support for honor killing may go hand in hand with support for government enforcing sharia (Islamic religious law): a 2013 Pew Research Center survey found that 89 percent of Muslims in Pakistan who favor implementing sharia as the law of the land also supported the stoning of people who had committed adultery. They were joined by 85 percent of such respondents in Afghanistan, 84 percent in Palestine, 81 percent in Egypt, and 67 percent in Jordan.

While most countries prohibit honor killings under laws governing more general instances of murder, the practice is socially condoned in a number of modern cultures and is legally sanctioned in some nations. Syria legally sanctioned the murder of any female family member for inappropriate sexual acts until 2009, when new legislation passed prohibiting honor-based violence. In Syria, Iraq, and Iran, defending family honor was considered a mitigating circumstance and perpetrators were subject to reduced sentences, though honor killings were still classified as murder under Iraqi, Iranian, and Syrian laws. In some countries, such as Jordan and Yemen, the government could place those at risk of being killed or harmed in acts of honor-based violence in indefinite administrative detention—in other words, imprison them. Jordan ended that practice in 2018 and instead began sending such individuals to a safe house.

An increasing number of honor killings have taken in places such as Iran in the first decades of the twenty-first century. Professor Fariba Parsa noted in 2021 that social changes that had increased Iranian women's literacy and awareness of their legal rights while men's cultural mindsets have not necessarily shifted. (Though most honor killings are committed by men, women have also been indicted for committing honor killings.)

One of the countries most associated with honor killings remains Pakistan. Amnesty International reported in 2010 that more than 647 women were the victims of honor killings in Pakistan in 2009, making Pakistan the country with the highest number of reported honor killings at the time. In 2016, the murder of Pakistani model Qandeel Baloch drew international attention to honor killings; Baloch was murdered by her brother, who perceived her fame and social media presence to have brought shame to his family. Following Qandeel's death, Pakistani lawmakers passed the Anti-Honor Killing Act, which prohibits pardons when a victim's family members forgive the perpetrator and instead sentences convicted murders in honor killing cases to lifetime imprisonment. Enforcement of that law has not been consistent, however, and Human Rights Watch reported in 2019 that an estimated one thousand Pakistani women die in honor killings each year.

Honor Killings Today

Quantifying the scale of honor killings is difficult. The number of countries reporting data on intimate partner and family-related femicides decreased from seventy-five countries in 2020 to only thirty-seven countries in 2023. The United Nations reported in 2024 that 51,100 women had died at the hands of intimate partners or relatives in 2023 alone; of those, a subset were killed in honor-based crimes. In some cases, police fail to identify a murder as an honor killing because family and extended members of the community aid the primary perpetrators in concealing the crime.

Some scholars and members of Islamic communities have objected to the use of the term “honor killing,” claiming that this term has become politicized by those in North America and Europe who seek to persecute members of Islamic communities. Legal authorities in the United States, Canada, and Europe have debated whether honor killing should be classified as a distinct category of crime for the purposes of investigation and prosecution. Some argue that separating honor killings from other instances of murder heightens cultural prejudice and fear, and that honor killings should therefore be treated as instances of premeditated murder and should be subject to existing laws and penalties.

These essays and any opinions, information, or representations contained therein are the creation of the particular author and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of EBSCO Information Services.


Bibliography

Ali, Ayaan Hirsi. “Honor Killings in America.” The Atlantic, 30 Apr. 2015, www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/04/honor-killings-in-america/391760/. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Caffaro, Federica, et al. “Gender Differences in the Perception of Honour Killings in Individualist versus Collectivist Cultures: Comparison between Italy and Turkey.” Sex Roles, vol. 71, nos. 9–10, 2014, pp. 296–318.

Chesler, Phyllis. “When Women Commit Honor Killings.” Middle East Quarterly, vol. 22, no. 4, 2015, pp. 1–12.

Chesler, Phyllis, and Nathan Bloom. “Hindu vs. Muslim Honor Killings.” Middle East Quarterly, vol. 19, no. 3, 2012, pp. 43–52.

Dogan, Recep. “Did the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 Get It Right? Are All Honour Killings Revenge Killings?” Punishment & Society, vol. 15, no. 5, 2013, pp. 488–514.

Dogan, Recep. “Different Cultural Understandings of Honor That Inspire Killing: An Inquiry into the Defendant’s Perspective.” Homicide Studies, vol. 18, no. 4, 2014, pp. 363–88.

“Five Essential Facts to Know about Femicide.” UN Women, 25 Nov. 2024, www.unwomen.org/en/articles/explainer/five-essential-facts-to-know-about-femicide. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Gill, Aisha K., and Avtar Brah. “Interrogating Cultural Narratives about 'Honour'-Based Violence.” European Journal of Women's Studies, vol. 21, no. 1, 2014, pp. 72–86.

Husseini, Rana. “The Historical and Religious Seeds of 'Honor.'” Abraham's Children: Liberty and Tolerance in an Age of Religious Conflict, edited by Kelly James Clark, Yale UP, 2012.

Husseini, Rana. “Murdered Women: A History of ‘Honour’ Crimes.” Al Jazeera, Aug. 2021, www.aljazeera.com/features/2021/8/1/murdered-women-a-history-of-honour-crimes. Accessed 6 June 2025.

“International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women 25 November.” United Nations, 25 Nov. 2024, www.un.org/en/observances/ending-violence-against-women-day. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Kinnear, Karen L. Women in Developing Countries: A Reference Handbook. ABC-Clio, 2011.

Muhammad, Niaz, et al. “Honor Killing in Pakistan: An Islamic Perspective.” Asian Social Science, vol. 8, no. 10, 2012, pp. 180–85.

Muise, Monique. “Shafia Verdict Sparks Debate: Was It an Honor Killing, or Just Plain Murder?” Gazette, 30 Jan. 2012, gazette.com.

Olwan, Dana M. “Gendered Violence, Cultural Otherness, and Honour Crimes in Canadian National Logics.” Canadian Journal of Sociology, vol. 38, no. 4, 2013, pp. 533–55.

“One Woman Killed Every 10 Minutes: The Harrowing Global Reality of Femicide.” United Nations, 25 Nov. 2024, news.un.org/en/story/2024/11/1157386. Accessed 6 June 2025.

“Pakistani Model Qandeel Baloch Killed by Brother after Friends' Taunts.” The Guardian, 27 July 2016, www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jul/28/pakistani-model-qandeel-baloch-killed-by-brother-after-friends-taunts-mother. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Parsa, Fariba. “Iranian Women Campaign to Stop the Rise in ‘Honor Killings.’” Middle East Institute, 26 Aug. 2021, www.mei.edu/publications/iranian-women-campaign-stop-rise-honor-killings. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Pew Research Center. The World's Muslims: Religion, Politics and Society, 30 Apr. 2013, www.pewresearch.org/religion/wp-content/uploads/sites/7/2013/04/worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-full-report.pdf. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Prochazka, Susanne J. “There Is No Honor in Honor Killings: Why Women at Risk for Defying Sociosexual Norms Must Be Considered a ‘Particular Social Group’ Under Asylum Law.” Thomas Jefferson Law Review, vol. 34, no. 2, 2012, pp. 445–503.

Rubin, Alissa J. “A Thin Line of Defense against ‘Honor Killings.’” The New York Times, 2 Mar. 2015, www.nytimes.com/2015/03/03/world/asia/afghanistan-a-thin-line-of-defense-against-honor-killings.html. Accessed 6 June 2025.

Suleman Anees, Mariyam. “‘Honor Killings’ Continue Unabated in Pakistan.” The Diplomat, 28 July 2022, thediplomat.com/2022/07/honor-killings-continue-unabated-in-pakistan/. Accessed 6 June 2025.

“Thousands of Honor Attacks in Britain Last Year.” Telegraph, 3 Dec. 2011, www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/8932926/Thousands-of-honour-attacks-in-Britain-last-year.html. Accessed 6 June 2025.

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Killings of Women and Girls by Their Intimate Partner or Other Family Members. Nov. 2021, www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/statistics/crime/UN_BriefFem_251121.pdf. Accessed 6 June 2025.

‌

More Like ThisRelated Articles

Related Articles (1)

Related Articles (1)