Honour and Violence

Nafisa Shah is a member of the National Assembly, the Lower House of the Parliament of Pakistan. Shah began her public life as a journalist, later studying social and cultural anthropology at the Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology, Oxford, where she received her D.Phil in 2011.

• List of Figures, Maps and TablesPrefaceAcknowledgementsNote on Sindhi Language and TransliterationList of AbbreviationsIntroduction: Honour Violence, Law and Power in Upper SindhPART I: A FRONTIER OF HONOUR VIOLENCE - THE PROBLEM OF KARO KARI IN UPPER SINDHChapter 1. Ghairat, Karo kari and the Spectacles of Violence: How Men and Women Become BlackChapter 2. Honour Violence, Law and Moral Power in Colonial SindhPART II: HONOUR, MORAL POWER AND LAW - MIRRORING OF LAW IN THE FORMS OF VIOLENCEChapter 3. Karo kari, Wali and Family Violence: Cultural Violence Mirroring LawChapter 4. Violence, Kin Groups and the Feud: The Making of Frontier JusticePART III: NORMALISING VIOLENCE - THE EVERY DAY WORLD OF UPPER SINDHChapter 5. Mediations on the Frontier: Ceremonies of Justice, Ceremonies of Faislo and the Ideology of KheerkhandrChapter 6. The Criminal Justice and ‘Legal’ Contests of Honour: Two Case StudiesChapter 7. The Sound of the Silence: Lives, Narratives and Strategies of Runaway and Missing Women of Upper SindhConclusionAppendicesAppendix I: The Sindh Frontier Regulation, 1872Appendix II: Text of the Provisions of Qisas and Diyat including subsequent AmendmentsAppendix IIIa: Disposal of Karo Kari Cases from 1995–2004Appendix IIIb: A Sample with Details Showing Relationship of the Victim, Accused and ComplainantGlossaryBibliography

“By examining the circumstances of the violence itself, Shah offers insights into the complex factors motivating honour violence. This study is therefore a significant and welcome addition to the anthropology of honour that, I believe, will change the way we understand honour killings, not only in Pakistan but in any place where people cover up their violence by resorting to arguments of honour.” • Anthropos“As the first sustained ethnographic analysis of accusations and killings in the name of honour, it is an important work that will be of interest, not just to legal anthropologists, but also to gender studies and the anthropology of the state.” • South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies“This is an extremely impressive achievement that makes a significant and substantial contribution to the ethnography of Pakistan and to the broader field of legal anthropology.” • Hastings Donnan, Queen's University of Belfast“This landmark study offers a new perspective for understanding and dealing with honour-related violence, demonstrating that honour does not lead to violence but that such violence is strategy ‘masked in honour’.” • Alison Shaw, University of Oxford“[Shah] presents her argument with fluency, creativity, and a rare humanistic sensitivity. This has all of the elements that allow a study to age into a classic.” • Mohammad Talib, Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies