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Samir Ben-Layashi delivered a paper on "The Discourse and Praxis of Medicine, Hygiene, and Body in Colonial Morocco", at the Middle East Studies Association of North America (MESA)'s annual meeting in Boston in November 2009.  In December, he spoke on "Public Health and Private Health in Morocco" at the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center's Ichilov hospital during a workshop on Medicine, Culture, and Society. In January 2010, Ben-Layashi was invited by Ben-Gurion University to comment on a documentary film by Sami Shalom-Chetrit, Azi Ya Yima, (Come here, My Mother) that treats the question of the first generation of Moroccan Jewish migrants, their absorption in Israel, and  their relationships with the Israeli born second generation. Also in January, Ben-Layashi participated in the Transcontinental Seminar on Social and Cultural History Writing, held at Switzerland's Zurich University, and included students from Zurich University, UCLA, and Tel Aviv University. At this seminar Ben-Layashi delivered a paper titled "From Healing Practices to Medical Practices: A Transition from Precolonial to Colonial Morocco." In March 2010, he commented on Dr. Miri Shefer's paper on "Miniatures in Ottoman Medical Illustrated Manuscripts" at The Zeev Rubin Forum, organized by the Graduate School of Historical Studies of the Tel Aviv University.