nine - Lives at risk: multiculturalism, young women and ‘honour’ killings

Summary

Introduction

Following the media coverage of several murders of ethnicised young women, risks associated with gender-related violence in minority ethnic communities in Britain are high on the public and political agenda (Gill, 2003; CPS, 2004). Why are the risks faced by young ethnicised women being highlighted by national and local mainstream agencies now? In this chapter we aim to unpack how risks that some young women face are constructed and heightened in the current climate of risk in relation to multiculturalism and Islamophobia in Britain. We argue that young women from some minority ethnic communities living in the UK are exposed to particular forms of risk. As gendered subjects they experience greater risk within both the cultural relativism of the British multicultural discourse and the private–public divide that characterises the domestic violence discourse. Multiculturalism, which is underpinned by notions of ‘respecting diversity and valuing cultural difference’, has for the most part engendered non-intervention when dealing with domestic violence rooted in cultural and religious practices in the private sphere of the home. However, in this chapter we also suggest that young women's risk is heightened because they ‘slip through the cracks’ of the multicultural discourse. Since 11 September and the 7 July bombings in Britain, young ethnicised women have become highly visible, but now they are contained and constructed in the public consciousness within a discourse of fear and risk posed by the presence of the Muslim alien ‘other’.

It is said that we are living in a ‘risk society’, however in the case of ethnicised young women and honour killings we have to be cautious of what risks are being selected for public attention and what risks are being marginalised. It is argued that risk theory pays insufficient attention to the role played by gender, age, social class, ‘race’, ethnicity and nationality in constructing differing forms of risk knowledge and experiences (Adam and van Loon, 2000). Lash (1993) suggests that we need to consider the way in which people respond to risk as members of cultural subgroups rather than as atomised individuals. He asserts the importance of understanding group membership, traditional conventions and social categories in structuring our moral values, assumptions and practices in responses to risk.