University of Tehran Published jointly with Iranian World Studies Association Journal of World Sociopolitical Studies 2588-3119 8 1 2024 01 01 Fighting the Monster: Nadia Murad’s Account of Resistance in The Last Girl 117 146 96768 10.22059/wsps.2024.371764.1411 EN Tayebeh Barati PhD Candidate of English Literature, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran 0009-0000-0990-4469 Behrooz Mahmoodi-Bakhtiari Associate Professor of Performing Arts, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran 0000-0002-5671-4040 Mohammad Marandi Professor of English Language and Literature, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran 0000-0001-8399-3287 Journal Article 2023 08 28 In the present paper, Murad’s memoir, <em>The Last Girl</em>, is scrutinized through the lens of Resistance Literature theories. First introduced by Kanafani (1966) and adapted by scholars such as Harlow (1987) and Sangari (1389 [2010 A. D.]), Resistance Literature has come to constitute pieces of writing that are written during or after a conflict by people experiencing life under the oppressive power. For Harlow and Sangari, what is of utmost importance is the accounts of war experience pictured by civilians from all walks of life. With the Syrian war with the ISIS escalating in 2011 and its consequent overflow into Iraq, the extremist terrorists brought the war to the doorsteps of ordinary people, massacring men and leaving women to deal with the aftermath. <em>The Last Girl</em> is Nadia Murad’s retelling of life under the ISIS as a Yazidi-Iraqi woman. At first glance, Murad pictures a sad, yet vivid image of the Yazidi genocide by the ISIS. However, in a deeper analysis of the text, one finds how being ripped apart from family, utterly displaced, terrorized and raped can also shape a rather stronger, resistant person. By applying Harlow and Sangari’s theories of Resistance to Murad’s memoir, what is manifested is the way in which being appointed to various kinds of terror in war-time can create a more resistant self in someone. https://wsps.ut.ac.ir/article_96768_54df2368f496d934724b7254b1934721.pdf