Honour-related violence and oppression : A qualitative study about social workers experience of the processing from sheltered housing

The aim of this study was to understand how social workers deal with honour-related violence, with special focus on the processing from sheltered housing. Our qualitative interviews with social workers that work with this kind of problems show that there are both obstacles and opportunities in the processing from sheltered housing. On the negative side are the loneliness, the shame and the guilt that the girls may experience when they need to leave their families. The social services can both be an obstacles and an opportunity. When the girls need to create a new life in a new city they have a lot of opportunities and in the same time it is hard to get to know new friends when you don´t know the city or have much money. The culture in Sweden and the Swedish norms are governing in an unproblematic way according to the social workers. They also think the girls need to deal with two different macro systems, the culture that the family comes from and the culture in Sweden. To help the girls in this situation requires much energy, time and labour. The professionals think these girls are dreaming about a normal life, but the girls must learn to protect themselves for the rest of their lives. This means that they never will be able to tell anyone the whole story of their background