Birthday: July 12, 1997 

Who is Malala Yousafzai?

She is a Pakistani education advocate who, at the age of 17 in 2014, became the youngest person ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize, and that was after surviving an assassination attempt by the Taliban.

Five Facts about Malala Yousafzai:

Inspirational Quotes from Malala Yousafzai

“The terrorists thought that they would change our aims and stop our ambitions, but nothing changed in my life except this: weakness, fear and hopelessness died. Strength, power and courage were born.”

“Education is neither eastern or western. Education is education and it’s the right of every human being.”

“The extremists were, and they are, afraid of books and pens. The power of education frightens them. They are afraid of women... Let us pick up our books and pens. They are our most powerful weapons.”

“If I win Nobel Peace Prize, it would be a great opportunity for me, but if I don't get it, it's not important because my goal is not to get Nobel Peace Prize, my goal is to get peace and my goal is to see the education of every child.”

“Dear friends, on the 9th of October, 2012, the Taliban shot me on the left side of my forehead. They shot my friends too. They thought that the bullets would silence us, but they failed.”

“I want people to remember that Pakistan is my country. Even if its people hate me, I will still love it.”

“I am only talking about education, women's rights and peace. I want poverty to end in tomorrow's Pakistan. I want every girl in Pakistan to go to school.”

“I am still the old Malala. I still try to live normally but yes, my life has changed a lot.”

Malala’s Biography

Early Life

Malala was born on July 12, 1997, in Mingora, Pakistan, located in the country's Swat Valley. Her parents are Ziauddin Yousafzai and Tor Pekai Yousafzai. She was given her first name Malala (meaning "grief-stricken") after Malalai of Maiwand, a famous Pashtun poet and warrior woman from southern Afghanistan. 

Her lower-middle-class family is Sunni Muslim and she was raised with two younger brothers. Fluent in Pashto, Urdu, and English, Malala was educated mostly by her father, who is a poet, school owner, and an educational activist himself, running a chain of private schools known as the Khushal Public School. 

In an interview, Malala once stated that she aspired to become a doctor, though later her father encouraged her to become a politician instead.  Ziauddin treated his daughter as special, allowing her to stay up at night and talk about politics after her two brothers had been sent to bed.

Turning Point

Known for human rights advocacy, Malala was just a young girl when she defied the Taliban in Pakistan and demanded that girls be allowed to have an education. She received a death threat and on October 9, 2012, a gunman shot Yousafzai in the head when she was traveling home from school. Amazingly, she survived the attack and continues to speak about the importance of education.

Mission and Work

Soon after her recovery, she gave a speech to the United Nations, published her first book called, I Am Malala, and co-founded the Malala Fund, a non-profit organization. She also had an audience with Queen Elizabeth II in Buckingham Palace.  After this, she spoke at Harvard University, and later she met with US President Barack Obama and his family; during that meeting, she confronted him on his use of drone strikes in Pakistan. She went on to address the Oxford Union and speak at the Girl Summit in London. In October 2014, she donated $50,000 to the UNRWA for the reconstruction of schools on the Gaza Strip.

Some of her accomplishments include the following: In 2012, she was the recipient of Pakistan's first National Youth Peace Prize and the 2013 Sakharov Prize. In 2014, she was the co-recipient of the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize, along with Kailash Satyarthi of India.

Malala’s Books

Her memoir, I Am Malala: The Story of the Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban, was co-written with British journalist Christina Lamb and published in October 2013 by Little, Brown & Company in the US and by Weidenfeld & Nicolson in the UK.

A children's edition of the memoir was published in 2014 under the title I Am Malala: How One Girl Stood Up for Education and Changed the World. According to Publishers Weekly, in 2017 the book had sold almost 2 million copies, and there were 750,000 copies of the children's edition in print.

Malala also authored a picture book, Malala's Magic Pencil, which was illustrated by Kerascoët and published on 17 October 2017.

Malala’s next book, We Are Displaced: True Stories of Refugee Lives, was published in January 2019. This book is about refugees and includes stories from Malala’s own life along with those of people she has met. Speaking about the book, Malala said that "What tends to get lost in the current refugee crisis is the humanity behind the statistics" and "people become refugees when they have no other option. This is never your first choice."

Recent Update

Malala began studying at Oxford University in 2017 and graduated in June 2020 with a degree in philosophy, politics, and economics.