Max Josef Migden is a DPhil candidate in Sociology at Nuffield College.

His research currently explores honour norms and honour killings, with a particular focus on the Indian context. In shedding light on both the effects of exogenous intervention and endogenous decision making – how family and clan-based councils assess the costs and benefits of corrective action – his work hopes to elucidate ways in which culturally-embedded concepts such as honour are operationalised and may possibly be challenged. He is supervised by Dr Ozan Aksoy. 

Max is also the 2026 recipient of the Oxford-Chelly Halsey Scholarship. He completed his MSc in Sociology at the University of Oxford, with his thesis entitled ‘Blood Relations’: Purity Norms, Inter-Caste Marriage and Honour Killing in India investigating the associative relationships between honour norms, their breakage and honour killings in India. He also hold a BSc (Hons) in Social Sciences from University College London.