The Dynamics of Honor Killings and the Perpetrators’ Experiences

Abstract

As a final part of a trilogy based on the same data set, this article adds to the growing body of knowledge on homicides against women by examining and identifying patterns, dynamics, and perpetrators’ experiences in honor killings. In-depth interviews conducted with a sample of the perpetrators provide further insight into the factors behind the perpetrators’ behavior, and the chain of events that may have been part of the context of the murder. Unlike two previous articles by this author, by exploring in as much detail as possible what was felt, lived, and experienced by the perpetrators in such cases, the author here attempts to identify concepts, patterns, and social dynamics that emerge from the accounts of the prisoners serving their sentences in Turkish prisons. The perpetrators’ perspectives are used to address whether special explanations are needed to explain the whole dynamics of honor killings.