In the Name of Honor

Presenter Information

Sabaina Khurram, Minnesota State University, Mankato

Location

CSU Ballroom

Start Date

9-4-2012 1:00 PM

End Date

9-4-2012 2:30 PM

Student's Major

Gender and Women's Studies

Student's College

Social and Behavioral Sciences

Mentor's Name

Maria Bevacqua

Mentor's Department

Gender and Women's Studies

Mentor's College

Social and Behavioral Sciences

Description

Although honor killing is part of the culture in Pakistan and Turkey, it is a serious injustice against women. I will be watching a documentary about it and an actual film. I will use content analysis, looking for whether certain aspects of those cultures creates motives for honor killings, and if so, what these are. I expect reasons for these killings to come from how patriarchy dominates in these societies to the point that women are treated as second class citizens in their homelands. I also expect to find that they are treated more as the property of a man or family than a human being. While culture in an important motive, I also expect to find another motive- one that relates to bias in punishment for “honor crime”. I will search for gender bias- men and women not being given equal punishment for the same crime. Also, I will see if fake honor killings are occurring as revenge for self-satisfaction. Culture can have a great impact on people. Because of this, I will see how these countries’ cultures might affect their societies, creating ideals such as bringing honor, proving masculinity, and social pressures. All of these can lead to honor killing. I seek to gain a lot of knowledge of a sensitive topic, and lead to more research to fight against a “hidden” crime. We need to address this issue, because if culture is shown to influence motives that lead to honor killing, then many women can be given justice and punishment for the perpetrators.