Use of Rhetoric in Malala Yousafzai’s Nobel Peace Lecture

“I am Malala. But I am also Shazia. I am Kainat. I am Kainat Soomro. I am Amina,” Malala Yousafzai said at age 17 to a crowd at the event in which she and fellow children’s education rights activist, Kailash Satyarthi, were named winners of the Nobel Peace Prize (Yousafzai). In a metaphorical and literal way, Malala Yousafzai is everyone she mentions as well as herself because she is their voice: a voice that amplifies individual children’s thoughts to the world. The power of Yousafzai’s voice is evident through her use of rhetorical devices such as anadiplosis, anastrophe, antithesis, aposiopesis, and anaphora. These devices uplift and bring fervor to her 2014 Nobel Peace Prize lecture Rhetorical devices are known for providing speeches with qualities that draw attention from the audience or reach them in a way speeches void of these techniques do not. The use of rhetoric comes from a background of developing strong speaking skills for the purpose of influence in civics. Following that, the art of rhetoric became a commonality among universities in the Medieval and Renaissance Ages (“Rhetoric”). People use rhetoric in both speaking and writing today for similar purposes. Yousafzai achieves the greatness of her speech through her masterful use of rhetorical devices throughout it.

The occasion of Yousafzai’s lecture is that of a Nobel Peace Prize acceptance ceremony. Malala Yousafzai and Kailash Satyarthi were declared winners of the Nobel Peace Prize for “their [international] struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education” (“Malala Yousafzai – Facts”). Yousafzai delivered her lecture on the tenth of December 2014 at the Oslo City Hall, Norway. She was introduced by Thorbjörn Jagland, Chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee before prompted to begin her performance. The social climate was that characteristic of 2014. The attendees to the lecture included “members of the Norwegian royal family, and perhaps members of royal families from other countries, as well as those who have chosen her for the award,” her family, friends, supporters, and teachers (“Audience”). Malala Yousafzai begins her address in the name of God, and addresses those granting her the prize: “Today is a day of great happiness for me. I am humbled” (Yousafzai). Emphasizing this feeling of being “humbled,” she thanks those who have helped her to this moment, including a special note to her parents and teachers.  Yousafzai recognizes that she has not received this award alone, but with Kailash Satyarthi. She says she is proud of what they have done, and what they vow to accomplish.

She uses her name as an icebreaker and proceeds to speak on who she is here for and why. In every corner of the world, education is a blessing and a necessity. Yousafzai explains how she and her friends got involved in their desire for education, believing they could do anything others thought only boys could, and how the ability to pursue that was revoked from them. In her speech, she emphasizes how this was a collective struggle: education has been denied to others; their home was a beautiful place, now reduced to a wasteland by war. Terrorists attacked her school bus, but their goal was ill achieved. Yousafzai and her brave sisters have not stopped learning or living. Facing these struggles, Yousafzai cites the Holy Quran to emphasize why injustice to some is a threat to the global community, quoting the passage, “do you not know, if you kill one person, you kill a whole humanity?” (Yousafzai).  In the same way, one person can stand up for all of humanity. Yousafzai made a choice. She chose to speak up rather than be silent. She and others could not stand by in the face of injustice. She represents these girls and children and their right to education. Why shouldn’t they have it?

Yousafzai points out that there have been many improvements already in education, then speaks on bureaucracy and demands further change in action for the bettering of quality worldwide education. She uses the rhetorical device of anadiplosis to emphasize that the struggle for education is ongoing. Anadiplosis is “the rhetorical repetition of one or several words; specifically, the repetition of a word that ends one clause at the beginning of the next” (“Glossary of Rhetorical Terms”). This device is used to link ideas together, and is described as when “the second clause starts with the same word which marks the end of the previous clause” (“Anadiplosis”). Yousafzai uses this rhetorical device when she states, “I will continue this fight until I see every child, every child — in school,” and also where she says, “And as I said we still see, we still see girls who have no freedom to go to school in the north of Nigeria” (Yousafzai). This form of repetition, using anadiplosis to link one clause to the next, emphasizes continuity over time. In doing so, Yousafzai shows the need for continued action in this cause.

Not much later in this Nobel Peace Prize lecture, Yousafzai uses anastrophe. Anastrophe, the transposition of normal word order, is important here because the speech is nearing its end (“Glossary of Rhetorical Terms”). She says, “Me. You. We. It is our duty” (Yousafzai). Yousafzai draws the audience’s attention through this uncommon word order. This technique has the potential to leave the listeners of her speech with a clear goal: to decide to act as Yousafzai and others have. Yousafzai’s distinct performance of this device, with pauses that imply the existence of full stops, catches the audience’s attention and prepares them to receive the unique delivery of her next sentence.

Yousafzai’s bold use of antithesis in this next line emphasizes the next sentence’s verbs: ‘becoming’ the first and ‘letting’ this be the last time. She declares, “Let us become the first generation that decides to be the last that sees empty classrooms, lost childhoods and wasted potentials” (Yousafzai). Antithesis is defined as “opposition, or contrast of ideas or words in a balanced or parallel construction” by the “Glossary of Rhetorical Terms” (“Glossary of Rhetorical Terms”). With a strong antonymic relationship, “first” and “last” are words that could hardly have more contrast. Yousafzai put a heavy emphasis on the end of her speech by using antithesis, and she goes on to use phrases with antithetical pairings such as ‘girl or boy,’ and ‘begin this ending.’ She continues with this pattern of pairings in phrases such as ‘years ago’ and ‘soon,’ along with “sisters and brothers, dear fellow children” (Yousafzai). With these numerous pairs of words using antithesis, Yousafzai puts emphasis on the end of her speech especially. With so many pairs of words representing the device called antithesis, most people who have listened to this lecture must have walked away with Yousafzai’s final words lingering, resonating in their minds. Both antithesis and aposiopesis are devices that encourage a magnified response of empathy and sympathy to the speaker’s cause of address, and encourage readers to notice the atmosphere this emphasis creates.

Aposiopesis is defined by the pausing or abrupt ellipses of or in speaking where the speaker is seemingly unable to continue due to the presence of passion (“Glossary of Rhetorical Terms”). Malala Yousafzai’s speech includes many examples of this device. She says once, “I’m proud — that we can work together,” and it is evident that in saying this she takes an aposiopesis pause which emphasizes her emotion. There is also aposiopesis when she says, “I want — there to be peace everywhere,” in which case the pause both catches the listeners’ attention and additionally demonstrates her passion for peace. Listeners may notice her use of aposiopesis again when she says “The first place this funding will go to is where my heart is, to build schools in Pakistan — especially in my home of Swat and Shangla,” and when she speaks of officials who already incorporate quality education into their kids lives but not the general public’s. Both these uses of the technique call attention to her passion and care for her home and for her cause. As she begins her lecture’s conclusion, she uses aposiopesis again, adding emotional pauses to her sequence of repeated phrases: “Let this be the last time — that… let this be the last time — that…  let this be the last time — that . . . let this be the last time —” (Yousafzai). One may notice that there is another pattern in this section, a repeated phrase.

The name of this rhetorical device is anaphora. Anaphora, according to Essential Literary Terms, “is the intentional repetition of words or phrases at the beginning of successive lines, stanzas, sentences, or paragraphs” (Hamilton 69). This is not the subtle kind of repetition seen in other devices like assonance, so the “pleasure of recognition” may or may not be Yousafzai’s purpose of using this device (“Assonance”). It most certainly does draw attention to the speaker and puts an emphasis on the words repeated. Yousafzai uses assonance at the very start of her lecture in giving thanks, thanking each individual or group beginning with the same, repetitious ‘thank you to.’ She utilizes it in the phrases, “it is for those . . . children,” then using ‘we,’ and on another occasion ‘we see.’ The anaphora in the conclusion of her lecture, repeating “let this be the last time,” emphasizes her call to action and helps make her claims more memorable to the listeners.

Yousafzai began her lecture with a sentence listing the many names of other children for whom she speaks; she returns to that message later in her speech, saying,  “This award is not just for me — it is for those forgotten children who want education. It is for those frightened children — who want peace. It is for those voiceless children who want change” (Yousafzai). The way she states these sentences combines the emotional pauses of aposiopesis with the repeated words at the beginning of successive phrases of anaphora (“Anaphora”). Yousafzai reiterates her commitment to amplifying the voices of the voiceless when she says “I am here to stand up for their rights, to raise their voice” (Yousafzai). In this active sentence, she uses asyndeton, which is a lack of conjunctions between coordinating phrases, clauses, or words. In this case asyndeton is utilized to place more emphasis on the verbs and objects of the sentence by removing the conjunction and its distracting continuance (“Glossary of Rhetorical Terms”). This shows that the main five rhetorical devices, anadiplosis, anastrophe, antithesis, aposiopesis, and assonance are not the only ones in this lecture. Yousafzai expertly combines careful rhetorical choices for the delivery of her passionate content to emphasize the purpose and impact of her lecture. To the listener, a considerable number of sections in this speech stand out from the others. The emphasis and efficacy of her Nobel Peace Prize lecture is in respective part due to the rhetorical devices Malala Yousafzai chose to use.

Works Cited

“Anadiplosis.” Literary Devices. 22 Oct. 2013, literarydevices.net/anadiplosis/. Accessed 25 Oct. 2022.

“Anaphora.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, 2022. merriam-webster.com/dictionary/anaphora. Accessed 28 Oct. 2022.

“Anastrophe.” Changing Minds. changingminds.org/techniques/language/figures_speech/anastrophe.htm. Accessed 28 Oct. 2022.

“Assonance.” Changing Minds. changingminds.org/techniques/language/figures_speech/assonance.htm. Accessed 28 Oct. 2022.

“Audience of Malala Yousafzai’s Nobel Peace Prize Speech.” Studienet. studienet.dk/malala-yousafzai-nobel-speech/analysis/audience. Accessed 25 Oct. 2022.

“Glossary of Rhetorical Terms.” University of Kentucky College of Arts & Sciences. https://mcl.as.uky.edu/glossary-rhetorical-terms. Accessed 25 Oct. 2022.

Hamilton, Sharon. Essential Literary Terms. 2nd ed., Norton, 2017.

“Malala Yousafzai – Facts.” NobelPrize.org, Nobel Prize Outreach AB 2022. Sat. 29 Oct 2022. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2014/yousafzai/facts/.

“Rhetoric.” Funk & Wagnall’s New Encyclopedia. 5th ed, 1991.

Yousafzai, Malala. “Malala Yousafzai: Nobel Peace Prize Lecture 2014.” YouTube, uploaded by Nobel Prize, 9 Jan. 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2DHzlkUI6s.