The so called "new transcultural psychiatry" proposes a reformulation of the relationship between words and things in the field of medicine. This reformulation consists of a polissemic reading of the illness experience. In this article our aim is to question this proposal and point out its limits, through a foucaultian perspective,. Considering the importance of discursivity in the theoretical work of the author, it is possible to radicalize the reformulation of the relationship between words and things; between discourse and its meaning and between speech and the speaking subject. Through the notion of discursive practice, discursivity gains materiality and produces forms of subjectivity. It is in the discursive order that the illness experience is initiated and that the illness subject is constructed; that illness emerges as an event and makes itself present as "disgovernance".
new transcultural psychiatry; illness experience; disgovernance; mental health; medical anthropology