"Shades of Foreign Evil": "Honor Killings" and "Family Murders" in the Canadian Press

This article compares murder cases labeled honor killings with cases labeled family/spousal murders in the Canadian news media, exploring the construction of boundaries between these two practices. We conducted a systematic qualitative content analysis, examining a sample of 486 articles from three major Canadian newspapers between 2000 and 2012. Our analysis shows that honor killings are framed in terms of culture and ethnic background, presenting a dichotomy between South Asian/Muslim and Western values. Conversely, articles presenting cases as family/spousal murders tend to focus on the perpetrators' personalities or psychological characteristics, often ignoring factors such as culture, patriarchy, honor, and shame.