Department of Psychiatry & Human Behavior
Two Seminal Books Published by Jefferson Faculty Member, Salman Akhtar M.D.
Salman Akhtar M.D., Professor of Psychiatry at Jefferson Medical College recently published two important books. Immigration and Acculturation continues Salman's widely acclaimed writings on psychological issues related to immigrants. In this book, he discusses the trauma of immigration and the acculturation process and the psychological defenses mobilized in the immigrant. He explores each aspect of the immigrant's life in detail and shows how unresolved conflicts are passed on to the next generation. Lastly, he suggests clinical strategies for working with immigrant and ethnically diverse patients and their children.
In Matters of Life and Death Salman shows that, psychologically speaking, death is always present in life and life in death. He discusses what is emotionally central to being alive and how death and awareness of death silently color our subjective experience. The fundamental thrust of this book is to enhance appreciation of aspects of life that have not been adequately discussed in the literature and to expand the view of death in ways that enrich life. A reviewer describes the book as "tightly packed, highly nuanced, a book of strong theoretical and much clinical significance."
