Salman Akhtar

Salman Akhtar (born 31 July 1946, Uttar Pradesh) is a psychoanalyst practicing in the United States. He is an author and Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia. He was born into a Muslim family in Khairabad, Uttar Pradesh to Jan Nisar Akhtar, a Bollywood film songwriter and Urdu poet, and singer Safia Akhtar, a teacher and writer. He is the brother veteran poet and film lyricist Javed Akhtar. His son Kabir Akhtar is an American television director and Emmy-nominated editor.

After receiving his M.D. at Aligarh Muslim University's Medical School in India, he did his internship at Maulana Azad Medical College of the University of Delhi in India. He moved to the U.S.A. in 1973 and did his residency and psychiatric training at the University of Virginia Medical Center, and then obtained psychoanalytic training from the Philadelphia Psychoanalytic Institute. Currently, he is Professor of Psychiatry & Human Behavior at Jefferson Medical College and psychiatrist an at the Jefferson University Hospital as well as a Training and Supervising Analyst at the Psychoanalytic Center of Philadelphia. He has served on the editorial boards of the International Journal of Psychoanalysis and the Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association. His more than 300 publications include 13 books. He has also served as the Film Review Editor for the International Journal of Psychoanalysis, and is currently serving as the Book Review Editor for the International Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies. He also has published seven collections of poetry and serves as a Scholar-in-Residence at the Inter-Act Theatre Company in Philadelphia.