This article examines the clinical and theoretical situation that leads us to propose the concept of a 'psychotherapeutic approach to exile' which we have considered for a dozen or so years, in order to re-examine the mental disorders of immigrants linked to the mouvement away from their place of origin. On the one hand, it involves a critical approach to the psychopathology of 'immigration' and 'transplantation', in which the model of direct traumatic causality and the adaptive target frequently dominates, followed by the culture-based model developed by French ethnopsychiatry. On the other hand, the therapeutic approach involved is based on listening to the patients, and on taking into account the subjective incidence of moving from place to place over several generations. During our studies, the question of 'place' emerged as the most critical issue to the extent that it is a risk factor, which could have an effect on both existential and psychic habitability. © 2003 Publié par Elsevier SAS.

Exil Exile psychopathology child place Existence Subjectivité Lieu Psychopathologie Space Espace Moving enfant Subjectivity Déplacement

patient care cultural anthropology immigrant pathogenesis place preference France correlation analysis human injury linguistics clinical practice ethnology medical practice statistical significance psychotherapy mental disease psychology technique Review psychoanalysis space