In the last several years, the Michigan Psychoanalytic Foundation (MPF) has supported the development of a number of outreach programs to various professional groups and ethnic communities. Among the latter is the Greater Detroit Indo-Pakistani American community, estimated at about 20,000 persons, of whom 15,000 are from India and 5,000 from Pakistan. To address the needs of this group, the Indo-Pakistani Liaison Committee (IPLC), chaired by Purnima Mehta, was established in 1993.
Two main factors generated interest in the committee's formation. First was the foundation's belief that inclusiveness and diversity can only enrich the field of psychoanalysis. Marvin Margolis, past president of the Michigan Psychoanalytic Institute and president-elect of The American, has been a forceful proponent of this belief. Second, it was clear that the Indo-Pakistani community's mental health requirements were not being adequately or sensitively met, by either the private or the public health care systems. IPLC recognized that psychoanalysis and psychoanalytically oriented psychotherapy were virtually unknown to this community. Through community contacts, the committee sensed the need for additional support related to various pressing issues: parent-child disputes, cross-cultural conflicts, and marital contention often related to disagreements over roles within the new culture. The existence of these problems was often communicated subtly, sometimes by women at social gatherings who feared identifying these concerns as requiring professional attention. Hence, the question remained: How could awareness and acceptance of psychoanalysis and psychoanalytically oriented psychotherapy be increased within a group that demonstrated a bias against the use of mental health services? The problem seemed daunting.
Yet, regardless of difficulties, the first task was to organize. Leaders of various organizations—the Michigan Association of Physicians from India, the Indo-American Forum for Political Education, Bharatiya Temple Family Services—were contacted, as were many Indo-Pakistani psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, counselors, and community elders. Members of these groups joined with local analysts, candidates, and residents to form the new liaison committee. IPLC's goals were then defined: the creation of a mechanism whereby the committee could devise and deliver educational, service-oriented, and cultural programs for both lay persons and professionals, and thereby increase the awareness of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy within the Indo-Pakistani community. The committee, borrowing from the experience of other liaison groups set up by MPF, knew that the success of these outreach programs depended on their being presented within the community rather than at the Institute.
Seeking to generate community interest through links to other groups, IPLC assisted other organizations, notably the Michigan Association of Physicians from India, in devising talks, discussions, and programs around community-oriented topics such as marital problems, parenting issues, and adolescent identity conflicts that result from growing up in two cultures. For example, psychodynamic and developmental perspectives were presented in simple, educational formats for two teenage-oriented symposia: “Dating Conflicts among Indian-American Teenagers,” held in May 1993, and “Being an Indian-American Teenager in America,” presented the following October. About a hundred parents and teenagers attended each program. As a result, a small but energetic youth division (a subcommittee of IPLC), with members ranging in age from sixteen to twenty-one, has helped forge strong links to the teenage community. Additionally, IPLC has worked with alumni of the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences in hosting a discussion entitled “Cross-Cultural Conflicts among Immigrant Women” in August 1993. These initial programs have generated a growing curiosity and interest within the community and an increase in referrals for psychoanalytic treatment.
Perhaps IPLC's most successful outreach effort has been its annual three-day programs featuring visiting psychoanalysts of Indo-Pakistani background. Visitors have included New Delhi analyst Sudhir Kakar in 1993 and Salman Akhtar, training and supervising analyst at the Philadelphia Psychoanalytic Institute, in 1994. Various formats have been used, including discussions of the classic films of Indian director Satyajit Ray. Kakar discussed Two Daughters, Akhtar, Home and the World. Meetings were also arranged with psychiatric residents at local hospitals, a large percentage of whom were of Indo-Pakistani background. Other formats included a poetry recital by Akhtar and IPLC member Aisha Abbasi, which captured the interest of many.
Encouraged by the reaction to these programs, IPLC sought to develop other programs in applied psychoanalysis. For example, the committee succeeded in networking with the Center for International Programs, Oakland University, and its director, Carlo Coppola. Together, IPLC and Oakland planned the March 1995 visit of Roshni Rustomji, professor emerita of India Studies at Sonoma State University, California, a specialist in comparative Greek and Indian literature and mythology, as well as Indian film. Rustomji presented a paper on comparative mythology (“The Birth Mythologies of Canesh and Typhaon: Sons of One Parent”) and read from her latest work, an anthology of writings on the immigrant experience entitled Living in America: Fiction and Poetry by South Asian American Writers, which demonstrates and underscores the bicultural conflict experienced by many Indo-Pakistani Americans. Rustomji also presented a discussion of Satyajit Ray's Pather Panchali at a dinner sponsored by the Friends of Asian Art, Detroit Institute of Art, prior to the showing of a new print of this work at the Detroit Film Theater. She also made two university presentations: a discussion of Indian film in a newly instituted course on the subject at the University of Michigan, and a paper on Ray's Devi at Oakland University. The links IPLC has forged with the Detroit Institute of Art, the University of Michigan, and Oakland University seem especially promising for the development of future programs.
The committee's other plans are varied in terms of both recruitment and offerings. It is a general belief that mentors of the same ethnic background can serve as valuable role models for individuals with an interest in psychoanalysis. With this in mind, IPLC is exploring the possibility of inviting Baljeet Mehra, a senior analyst with the British Psychoanalytical Society, to visit the Michigan Institute next year. It is hoped that such programs will further stimulate the recruitment for psychoanalytic training of mental health professionals of Indo-Pakistani background.
Most important, the establishment of IPLC has brought psychoanalysis into contact with an immigrant community, an endeavor that has led to increased sensitivity and awareness vis-à-vis
Purnima Mehta, M.D., is a graduate adult, child, and adolescent analyst.
the psychodynamics of immigrant experience, as well as valuable exposure to a unique and rich civilization. The experience has truly been mutually beneficial. It will be further strengthened by a course on Indo-Pakistani literature, centered around the theme of immigration, that is being designed for mental health professionals and the general community by the Michigan Institute's extension division. It will be team taught by Coppola, a specialist in Indo-Pakistani literature and editor of the Journal of South Asian Literature, and psychoanalysts from the Institute, including Purnima Mehta and Dwarkanath Rao.
The Indo-Pakistani Liaison Committee has brought together analysts, academicians, and immigrant mental health professionals in a unique attempt to serve the South Asian community. The committee happily acknowledge that in return they have been equally enriched by contact with members of this new group of Americans.