Salman Akhtar, MD, is professor of psychiatry at Jefferson Medical College and a training and supervising analyst at the Psychoanalytic Center of Philadelphia. He has served on the editorial boards of the International Journal of Psychoanalysis and the Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association. His more than 450 publications include twenty-three solo authored books – Broken Structures (1992), Quest for Answers (1995), Inner Torment (1999), Immigration and Identity (1999), New Clinical Realms (2003), Objects of Our Desire (2005), Regarding Others (2007), Turning Points in Dynamic Psychotherapy (2009), The Damaged Core (2009), Comprehensive Dictionary of Psychoanalysis (2009), Immigration and Acculturation (2011), Matters of Life and Death (2011), Psychoanalytic Listening (2013), Good Stuff (2013), Sources of Suffering (2014), No Holds Barred (2016), A Web of Sorrow (2017), Mind, Culture, and Global Unrest (2018), Silent Virtues (2019), Tales of Transformation (2022), In Leaps and Bounds (2022), and In Short (2024) – as well as sixty-nine edited or coedited volumes in psychiatry and psychoanalysis. Dr. Akhtar has delivered many prestigious addresses and lectures including, most significantly, the inaugural address at the first IPA-Asia Congress in Beijing, China (2010). Dr. Akhtar is the recipient of the Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association’s Best Paper of the Year Award (1995), the Margaret Mahler Literature Prize (1996), the American Society of Psychoanalytic Physicians’ Sigmund Freud Award (2000), the American College of Psychoanalysts’ Laughlin Award (2003), the American Psychoanalytic Association’s Edith Sabshin Award (2000), Columbia University’s Robert Liebert Award for Distinguished Contributions to Applied Psychoanalysis (2004), the American Psychiatric Association’s Kun Po Soo Award (2004), the Irma Bland Award for being the Outstanding Teacher of Psychiatric Residents in the country (2005), and the Nancy Roeske Award (2012). He received the Sigourney Award (2013), which is the most prestigious honor in the field of psychoanalysis. Dr. Akhtar is an internationally sought speaker and teacher, and his books have been translated in many languages, including German, Turkish, and Romanian. His interests are wide and he has served as the film review editor for the International Journal of Psychoanalysis, and is currently serving as the book review editor for the International Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies. He has published eighteen collections of poetry and serves as a scholar-in-residence at the Inter-Act Theatre Company in Philadelphia. His Selected Papers (Vols I–X) were recently published and released at a festive event held at the Freud House & Museum in London.
A search for answers on the subject of sadomasochism: its origins, forms and functions, nature, and societal status. An international group of distinguished psychiatrists, psychologists, and... (more)
With contributions from Anne Adelman, Salman Akhtar, Shawn Blue, Ann Eichen, Arpana G. Inman, Sameer Khan, Olga Santa Maria, Andrew Smolar, and Pratyusha Tummala-Narra.
This is a book about... (more)
Unlit Corners endeavours to bring light to neglected character traits which many struggle to overcome. Filled with relevant case studies and carefully crafted psychoanalytic theory, the book... (more)
One hundred (and one) tales to mark Salman Akhtar’s one hundredth book! Divided into eight informative parts – Dr Akhtar’s journey to psychoanalysis; the lessons he learned from his teachers,... (more)
This edited collection gathers together erudite and considered contributions from Salman Akhtar, Cobi Avshalom, Brett Clarke, Mali Mann, Gila Ofer, Thomas Ogden, Louis Rothschild, Batya Shoshani,... (more)
In Short: Private Notes of a Psychoanalyst is wise, uplifting and inspiring. Salman Akhtar brings his talent for poetic literature to gift us 111 pithy ‘proto essays’ on a wide range of subjects. His... (more)
Freud's Beyond the Pleasure Principle constitutes a major landmark and a real turning point in the evolution of psychoanalytic theory. Pushing aside the primacy of the tension-discharge-gratification... (more)
Food matters because food is essential to sustain life, and food matters are complex and wide-ranging, encompassing the symbolic as well as the practical. The rich discussions of the relationship... (more)
A tour de force from the inimitable Salman Akhtar. Dr Akhtar brings his encyclopaedic knowledge of psychoanalysis to present a deceptively simple guide to personality development across the full... (more)
'Joseph Breuer’s celebrated patient, Anna O., designated psychoanalysis to be a "talking cure". She was correct insofar as psychoanalysis does place verbal exchange at the center stage. However, the... (more)
This book provides easy to read, concise, and clinically useful explanations of over 1800 terms and concepts from the field of psychoanalysis. A history of each term is included in its definition and... (more)
With contributions from Salman Akhtar, Patricia Boguski, Ann Eichen, April Fallon, Theodore Fallon, Jr., Rama Rao Gogineni, Mark Moore, Sonja Ware.
Collectively authored by psychoanalytic... (more)
Good Stuff is divided into two main parts; Part I addresses Positive Attributes and Part II, Positive Actions. The former contains chapters on Courage, Resilience, and Gratitude. The latter contains... (more)
A late-comer to psychoanalytic theorizing, 'shame' results from a disjunction between the ego and the ego-ideal. A complex psychosocial experience, it is comprised of a painful exposure of one’s... (more)
Guilt: Origins, Manifestations, and Management is replete with clinical pearls and highly useful tips for the management of patients driven by feelings of guilt and remorse. Eight distinguished... (more)
Across the lifespan we may experience moments of sublime intimacy, suffocating closeness, comfortable solitude, and intolerable distance or closeness. In Interpersonal Boundaries: Variations and... (more)
This book integrates psychiatry and psychoanalysis to present deeper and sounder clinical profiles of the personality disorders than have been hitherto available. (more)
"The Future of an Illusion" reveals Freud's reflections about religion as well as his hope that in the future science will go beyond religion, and reason will replace faith in God. The discussion... (more)
Death is a much avoided topic. Literature on mourning exists, but it focuses chiefly upon the death of others. The inevitable psychic impact of one's own mortality is not optimally covered either in... (more)
Ever since Freud proposed that certain ideas can be permitted to become conscious only in their inverted and negative forms, interest has grown into the entire realm of the presence of absence, so to... (more)
Betrayal underlies all psychic trauma, whether sexual abuse or profound neglect, violence or treachery, extramarital affair or embezzlement. When we betray others, we violate their confidence in us.... (more)
If there ever was one word that could represent the essence of Freud’s work, that word would be ‘unconscious’. Indeed, Freud himself regarded his 1915 paper ‘The Unconscious’ as central to clarifying... (more)
In this compact and pithy book, the distinguished and prolific psychoanalyst Salman Akhtar steps out of his consulting room to address certain matters of urgent global concern. These include... (more)
Beginning with Freud’s celebrated case of Little Hans, psychoanalysts and psychotherapists have been intrigued with the topic of fear. Eclipsed in theoretical writings by the term ‘anxiety’, fear... (more)
This concise and well-written book deals with six important roots of human anguish. It divides the six areas into those primarily affecting the individual and those primarily affecting others around... (more)
In this elegantly written book, eight distinguished psychoanalysts address the ubiquitous phenomenon of guilt. They describe the childhood experiences that form the bedrock of this emotion and... (more)
This comprehensive and tightly argued book deals with the process through which a coherent self evolves, the various ways such development fails to occur, and the therapeutic measures to put things... (more)
The Electrified Mind explores the positive and negative aspects of the internet and other communication technologies on the people who use them in order to help mental health care professionals... (more)
This book is a lexical ambassador with the dual responsibility of bridging the West and East and enhancing psychoanalytic conceptualization in the course of such an encounter. By juxtaposing the... (more)
Moving from one country to another causes a radical alteration of one's cultural and geophysical surround. Separation from friends and family, loss of valued possessions, and encountering new ways of... (more)