We’re at a time when issues of immigration and displacement are more relevant than ever. The future of the Rohingya community of Bangladesh is still uncertain, while in America, Trump is aggressively pushing for the controversial wall along the US-Mexico border. Against this backdrop, youth icon and activist Malala Yousafzai released her new book, We Are Displaced: My Journey and Stories from Refugee Girls Around the World on Jan 08, 2018. The book gives a voice to young refugees that Malala has interacted with over the years.
We are Displaced was born out of Malala’s visits and experiences at refugee camps. The Nobel Peace Prize winner reconsiders her own displacement — as a child in Pakistan where she was an Internally Displaced Person, and then, as an activist who could not visit her hometown. The book is part memoir and part communal storytelling. She highlights the stories of courageous girls who carry on even when they lose their homes, family and community. By writing about their journeys, Malala turns these refugees from impersonal statistics to a living, breathing people. Be it Maria, who had to flee with her mother in the darkness of the night after her father was murdered, Zaynab who was out of school for two years as she fled war before making it to America, or her sister Sabreen, who survived an arduous travel to Italy — these are stories of resilience, fortitude and hope. As Malala says, we have a lot to learn from refugees.
This is Malala’s third book. In 2013, she wrote a memoir, I am Malala: The Story of the Girl Who Stood Up for Education and was Shot by the Taliban (co-written with Christina Lamb), and in 2017, she authored a children’s picture book, Malala’s Magic Pencil.
Get a copy of We Are Displaced here.
Featured photograph: Getty Images (Malala Yousafzai)
