L’Oedipe Africain, A Retrospective

Abstract L’Oedipe Africain is a vital text from the early years of post-colonialism and transcultural psychiatry. Psychologist Marie-Cécile Ortigues and her philosopher husband, Edmond Ortigues produced this study after 4 years of clinical work (from 1962 to 1966) at the Fann Hospital in Dakar, Senegal. These were years of intense creativity at Fann, as Dr Henri Collomb set in motion a series of innovations that transformed a classical asylum into an open-door, culturally sensitive therapeutic center. L’Oedipe Africain confronts the transcultural project in the early post-colonial era with such candor and insight that it continues to speak to the profession today. The discussion of transference in situations of racial and cultural difference, and the theorizing of the cultural and universal dimensions to the psyche, emerge as enduring contributions of this text. The assumptions about history, tradition and modernity, and the gloss on female patients prove less durable. Key words Africa • gender • Oedipus • post-colonial • psychoanalysis In 1966 the husband–wife team of Edmond and Marie-Cécile Ortigues published the first edition of their psychoanalytic study, l’Oedipe Africain. In this book, Marie-Cécile Ortigues, a psychologist by training, and her philosopher husband, Edmond, offer a series of case histories followed by theoretical reflections that bring to life Senegalese struggles with modernization. The search for the patient’s voice and the careful Vol 42(2): 171–203 DOI: 10.1177/1363461505052659 www.sagepublications.com Copyright © 2005 McGill University transcultural psychiatr