Between the Mad and the Bad: Psychiatrists and Patients in Egypt’s State Asylums

Abstract

The study of mental illnesses and asylums have emerged as fundamental areas of historical inquiry. Research on disability studies and the histories of mental health are growing fields encouraging a rethinking of the cultural, social, economic, and political histories of the Middle East. The history of mental asylums reflects the multiple ways in which colonial governments and modern nation-states defined their national projects and relationships with their subjects. Studying colonial asylums, psychiatry, and constructions of mental illnesses is central to understanding Egypt’s history, shedding light on significant historical processes such as colonization, state building, modernization, medicalization, and professionalization.

Using mental health as the lens through which to examine the colonial state and its engagement with various actors, the dissertation investigates the impact of the British occupation on the development of Egypt’s state asylums of ‘Abbāsiyya and Khānka as well as on the professionalization of psychiatry and the experiences of the asylums’ patients and their families. The goal is to provide a holistic approach to the study of the history of mental health and psychiatry in Egypt, investigating its asylums, doctors, attendants, patients, and their families.

Through the analysis of a wide range of primary and secondary sources written in Arabic, French, and English, including citizen petitions (‘arḍaḥāls), referral memoranda (tadhkaras), Ministry of Interior reports, Reports of the Lunacy Division and the Department of Sanitary Services and Public Health, as well as government and Foreign Office correspondences, the dissertation examines the multi-faceted history of mental health and psychiatry by engaging with its diverse state and non-state actors. The dissertation examines the history of Egypt’s asylums and their relationship with the state, interrogating their significance to the British occupation and their role in the maintenance of order and security. It also moves beyond the asylum itself, focusing on Egyptian psychiatrists and the development of the psychiatric profession. The study further examines the experiences of the asylum’s patients and their families. The ultimate objective of the dissertation’s different chapters is to demonstrate the transformative impact of the British occupation on the asylum, the psychiatric profession, the care and treatment of its patients, and the experiences of their families.