Rita El Khayat on Moroccan Psychiatry and Sexuality

It is generally agreed that it is difficult for Arab‐Muslim women doctors to speak of intimate and sexual matters with their patients. It is even more difficult for these women doctors themselves to speak publicly of these subjects, and even more so of their own intimate experiences and their own emotions. In fact, it was only in June 2001 that the Arab Psychiatrists’ Association devoted its meeting to the mental health of women. We might even suggest that before this date this subject was hardly addressed within the profession. In the last several years, a number of women professionals in the field have published their memoirs, in which they discussed women, the family, their personal lives and sexuality. In this article the work of Rita El‐Khayat is assessed. It is suggested that in the Arab world, on the occasions where women or women doctors begin to examine the relationship between patriarchal medical institutions and the women within them—both caregivers and patients—they confront taboos which neces...