What does femicide mean?
Femicide refers to the intentional killing of women or girls because of their gender, and it occupies an important place in modern discussions of violence against women. Unlike general homicide, the term highlights the gendered motivation behind such killings, making it central to the language of law reform, human-rights reporting, and feminist scholarship. The word gained prominence internationally in the late twentieth century, particularly through activism in Latin America drawing attention to the murders of women in Mexico and Central America, and several countries have since adopted it as a distinct criminal offense. In usage it appears most often in formal registers — news reports, academic studies, legislative texts, and advocacy campaigns — where phrases like 'femicide rate' and 'femicide epidemic' are common. Its power lies in naming a pattern that generic terms for killing obscure, turning individual tragedies into a recognizable social problem worthy of policy response.
nounThe intentional killing of women or girls because of their gender, especially as recognized in legal and human-rights contexts.
- The intentional killing of women or girls because of their gender, treated as a distinct category of violence in law, criminology, and human-rights discourse.
- More broadly, any act of violence resulting in the death of a woman or girl in the context of gender-based violence.
"Activists called for femicide to be codified as a distinct crime in national law."
"Researchers documented an alarming rise in femicide across the region over the past decade."
"The court's ruling marked one of the first convictions in which femicide was treated as a separate offense from murder."
The plural denotes multiple individual instances or counted cases, as in statistical or journalistic contexts.
"Hundreds of femicides are reported in the country each year."
The word 'femicide' didn't enter English until the 19th century — but it took a wave of international activism in the 1990s to make it part of the global human-rights vocabulary.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Etymology of femicide
Femicide combines the Latin element femina, meaning 'woman', with the suffix -cide, derived from Latin caedere, meaning 'to kill' or 'to cut down'. This productive suffix also gives us homicide, genocide, infanticide, and regicide, all denoting the killing of a particular class of being. The word entered English in the nineteenth century, though it remained rare until the late twentieth century, when human-rights activists — notably in Latin America — revived and popularized it to describe the systematic killing of women.
Related word forms
How femicide is actually used
Femicide is a formal, often emotive term used chiefly in journalism, law, criminology, and activism rather than everyday conversation. It carries strong moral and political connotations, framing the killing of women as gender-motivated violence rather than ordinary homicide. Usage varies by jurisdiction: some countries have enacted femicide as a specific legal offense, while elsewhere it remains primarily a sociological or advocacy term. The plural 'femicides' refers either to individual instances or to cases counted collectively.
Easily confused with femicide
Feminism is the advocacy of women's rights on the basis of gender equality, whereas femicide is the deliberate killing of women or girls because of their gender.