One of the starkest manifestations of violence against women is the
elderly missing women phenomenon. Missing women, a term introduced by
Amartya Sen in 1990, refers to abnormally high female mortality in
certain parts of Asia and Africa compared to the rest of the world. As
an elderly missing women phenomenon, this chapter conceptualizes the
result of many discriminating factors at each stage of the female life
course, for example, female infanticide before/at birth, gender
discrimination in health and nutrition in childhood, early marriage and
honor killings in young adulthood, domestic violence in adulthood and
accusations of witchcraft in old age. The aim of this chapter is to
examine violence and discrimination against women in a life course
perspective and explain the elderly missing women phenomenon by these
factors.