90 GENDER PERSPECTIVES ON TORTURE: Law and Practice Introduction For decades, anthropologists and sociologists have developed a rich body of research on the complex, multifaceted concept of honor. In his influential article, Pitt-Rivers (1966) describes honor as an individual’s claim to pride, as well as his or her right to be granted it by others (Pitt-Rivers 1966) realized through a system of symbols, values, and rules of conduct. Although this socially constructed system, known as the “honor code,” varies between cultures (Gill 2014), it nonetheless shares a number of common elements across cultures. While not usually considered cultures of honor, contemporary Western cultures do value honor in relation to a person’s integrity, pride, and self-worth. Individuals view themselves as honorable to the extent that they feel pride as a result of their own actions and beliefs. Western societies tend to consider cultures of honor as those that place honor above all else, including the lives of female family members who are perceived to have committed actions of shame and dishonor, typically through sexual or other forms of disobedience. Drawing on the specific case of Shafilea Ahmed, a UK-born woman of Pakistani origin who was murdered by her parents following myriad cultural transgressions in their eyes, including her refusal to enter into an arranged marriage in Pakistan, this paper presents a critical analysis of how the prosecution in this case, as well as the media, identified a culture of honor as the primary expla­ nation for her murder without adequately exploring other contributing factors, and, consequently, perpetuating harmful generalizations about ethnic minority groups in Britain. The Face of “Honor”-Based Violence The United Nations (UN) Population Fund estimates that between 5,000 and 12,000 women are murdered in the name of honor each year, primarily in the Middle East and Asia (Manjoo 2011, Gill 2014)1. It is impossible to determine the true number of honor killings or the true incidence of “honor”-based violence (HBV) more generally. Reports to the police are rare and sporadic, not least because both male and female family members often try to conceal honor-related crimes and many victims of HBV are abducted and never reported missing (Manjoo 2011). Western countries with large multi-ethnic immigrant communities, such as Britain, began recognizing HBV as a significant and growing domestic issue in the late twentieth century. Understandings and awareness of HBV shifted accordingly, prompting the initiation of concerted national and international efforts to counter it. In Europe, most reported honor killings occur in South Asian, Turkish, or Kurdish migrant communities; however, there have also been cases in Brazil, Italy, and the United States involving Roman Catholic perpetrators with varied ethnic back­ grounds (Chesler 2010). Perpetrators are often part of minority groups, even in countries where HBV is prevalent, a fact that underlines the significance of economic and social marginalization as aggravating factors (Kulczycki and Windle 2011). For example, Sheeley (2007) surveyed a stratified convenience sam­ ple from Jordan—a nation with a strong tradition of honor. A third of respondents knew someone who had been threatened with HBV, and 28 percent knew someone who had died as a result of it. While incidence data do not explain the mechanisms through which cultural concerns with honor The UN has estimated that at least 5,000 women are murdered by family members each year in ‘honor’ killings. According to women’s advocacy groups the figure could be around 20,000. In general, given the difficulty surrounding the reporting of these crimes, official statistics are understood to be grossly underestimates (see A/HRC/20/16). 1