84 pages • 2 hours read
Christina Lamb, Malala YousafzaiI Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban
Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | Adult | Published in 2012A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Chapters 12-15Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 2: The Valley of Death
Chapter 12 Summary: The Bloody Square
Dead bodies are left in the square so people could see them each morning, as a warning against resisting the Taliban. The Taliban continues to target culture, and Malala notes the disappearing music and dancing that traditionally made up their lives. “I couldn’t understand what the Taliban were trying to do. ‘They are abusing our religion,’ I said in interviews. ‘How will you accept Islam if I put a gun to your head and say Islam is the true religion? If they want every person in the world to be Muslim, why don’t they show themselves to be good Muslims first?’” (149).
Unfortunately, few speak out. “It seemed as if people had decided the Taliban were here to stay and they had better get along with them” (149). Malala’s father is threatened—people tell him about his name being mentioned on Mullah FM. Regardless, her father continues to speak out. For others, the risk remains too high. “[F]ear is very powerful and in the end it was this fear that had made people turn against [others]. Terror had made people cruel. The Taliban bulldozed both our Pashtun values and the values of Islam” (153).
Chapter 13 Summary: The Diary of Gul Makai
A man from BBC radio is looking for a female teacher or schoolgirl to write a diary describing the situation in Swat. Malala offers herself as the subject. To make it easier for Malala, the man would call from a secure phone and guide her through questions. They used the pseudonym Gul Makai, meaning “cornflower.” He looked for “personal feelings and what he called my ‘pungent sentences’” (156).
Malala writes about many topics, including the burqa: “When you’re very young, you love the burqa because it’s great for dressing up. But when you are made to wear it, that’s a different matter” (156). Malala wants to tell everyone she is Gul Makai, but the BBC representative warns her against it. Malala does not believe that anyone would attack her, a child.
“I began to see that the pen and the words that come from it can be much more powerful than machine guns, tanks or helicopters” (157). Despite her powerful words, Malala watches her class dwindle from 27 to ten. Unfortunately, on January 14, school ends for Malala and all other girls. She wakes up to a Pakistani journalist’s cameras. He follows Malala and documents what she did without school as part of a documentary for the New York Times.
Her father promises her that she will go back to school. Malala keeps fighting by speaking to the media. “Education is education. We should learn everything and then choose which path to follow. Education is neither Eastern nor Western, it is human” (162). The trips outside of the valley offer a short reprieve from threats.
Chapter 14 Summary: A Funny Kind of Peace
Fazlullah lifts the ban for girlsten and younger. Malala and others pretend to be younger. After about a week, gunshots ring out in celebration: The Taliban and the government came to a truce agreement. Their excitement was short-lived.
A friend and TV reporter is murdered during a peace march. Other countries begin criticizing what is happening in Swat. “But none of those people had to live here. We needed peace whoever brought it. In our case it happened to be a white-bearded militant called Sufi Mohammed” (169).
Chapter 15 Summary: Leaving the Valley
For their safety, Malala and her family leave the valley. Malala leaves behind most of her personal belongings, even her awards. The family members become IDPs—internally displaced persons. “It sounded like a disease” (177). Malala prays over her belongings, asking that they be protected while they were away. Thousands of people leave the valley. “[M]y father said, ‘It is as though we are the Israelites leaving Egypt, but we have no Moses to guide us’” (179). Her father speaks to the media during the exodus.
When her father leaves to warn others of the problems coming toward them, Malala sees her mother’s true strength. A man tries to approach them, but Malala’s mother hits him with her shoe. “I always knew my mother was a strong woman but I looked at her with new respect” (181).
Once in a new town, Malala continues to go to school. She is taught with boys because there isn’t enough room or staff to teach her separately. One day, for a parents visiting day, the school encourages boys to make speeches. The girls are encouraged to do so, but over a loud speaker, away from the crowds. Instead, Malala speaks in front of the crowd. “People in the audience seemed surprised and I wondered whether they thought I was showing off or whether they were asking themselves why I wasn’t wearing a veil” (183).
Malala’s family continues to move place to place, ending up going to four different places in two months. All she wishes for is peace.
Chapter 12-15 Analysis
Malala begins to learn the power of words. Despite further subduing and oppressing methods from the Taliban, Malala speaks out. She puts effort into interviewing with different media outlets and describing what is happening in Pakistan. The news channel BBCS affords her the ultimate gesture of word power by giving her a blogging position with them. Malala’s grows leaps and bounds in these chapters.
The schools shut down, then the ban is lifted, and finally, a military operations sweeps into Swat. Yet, Malala’s growth continues. She despairs briefly when the schools shut down, but when the ban is lifted for girls 10 years old and younger, she flexes her strength as an individual and pretends to be younger. Her courage outmatches the Taliban’s efforts to stop her from learning. Even when the military operation moves in and her family must move out, Malala finds peace in education. Surrounded by boys in class, Malala grows more confident in herself. Despite girls traditionally making speeches over the loud speaker rather than in person, Malala puts herself on stage with the boys, proving that she is equal.
Readers also witness a continued bond between Malala and her father. He supports her interviewing and blogging efforts despite threats leveled against him. When Fazlullah shuts down schools for girls, Malala’s father insists she will continue to learn, refusing to let his daughter back down. He even supports her will to get on stage with the boys. In his eyes, she is no different than a son.
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