Through Pembroke Center, Turkish scholar probed deeper into honor crimes

by Tracie Sweeney

As a postdoctoral fellow at Brown's Pembroke Center for Teaching and Research on Women, Dicle Kogacioglu had the opportunity to further her exploration of the issue of honor crimes - the murder of a woman by members of her family who do not approve of her sexual behavior.

In her native Turkey, "the general line is that honor crimes are deeply rooted" in tradition, Kogacioglu said. Although Turkey does not keep official statistics about the crime, her research notes that between 1994 and 1996, 53 women were victims of honor killings.

It is a problem about which Turkish political and social institutions appear to be doing little. In a paper to be published in the next issue of Differences: A Journal of Feminist Cultural Studies, published by the Pembroke Center, Kogacioglu, a legal sociologist, notes that Turkish judicial authorities continue to take family honor into account when considering penalties for honor crimes, and a proposed revision in the Turkish judicial code "can be interpreted to legitimize honor killings." In addition, the state provides scant resources for women who are victimized due to reasons of honor.

How Turkey deals with honor crimes could play a significant role in Turkey's quest for admission into the European Union, Kogacioglu says. "Thanks to women's struggles in Europe, it is possible to place gender issues on the [EU] agenda," she said. She noted, however, that the EU's priority is market unification. "Turkey is very ambitious," she said. "It wants to be a more enlightened market. Whatever gender concerns are complementary to the economy will be important."

Honor crimes, however, apparently are not one of those concerns. In fact, Kogacioglu writes, the EU itself has difficulty handling issues of "gender equality that are not easily framed within a market paradigm." Its approach to honor crimes, she writes, "is generally timid and low-key."

In her paper, titled "The Tradition Effect: Framing Honor Crimes in Turkey," Kogacioglu concludes that "to what extent feminists around the globe will try to understand the institutional dynamics that reproduce honor crimes is an open question. What is clear, however, is that without such efforts to read between the lines of institutional discourse and work for institutional change, the tradition effect is bound to continue to do its work."

At the Pembroke Center, Kogacioglu found what she called "a rare mix" of personal and professional support "that let me focus on themes to pursue as a scholar within my discipline." Emerging from those themes is a project on transnational politics and the globalization of gender. The project, which Kogacioglu is co-directing, will result in three conferences (the first to be held at Brown in 2005-06) involving scholars and representatives from the EU, the United Nations and the World Bank.

Kogacioglu completed her Pembroke fellowship this past May. In the fall, she assumes a new post as assistant professor at Sabanci University in Istanbul.