The Fragility of "Aha!" Moments: Understanding Through Media

Have you ever watched news, movies, or other media and thought, "Aha, so this is what the Arab world is like"? However, that "aha" moment is surprisingly unreliable. Why does a certain line get a laugh? Why is a particular silence so heavy? Why does the same word carry a different emotional temperature depending on the scene? Within these moments, the structures and values of society are quietly reflected.

Focusing primarily on Egypt, my research uses films, TV dramas, comedies, news, and everyday language as materials to track how "religion" and "secularism" negotiate with each other in real-world settings and how they have been re-narrated. For example, films, serial dramas, and satirical comedies are not merely entertainment; they are devices for sharing "difficult things" by bypassing them through language and humor. Conversely, precisely because there is censorship and "lines that must not be crossed," creators weave messages into symbols, metaphors, the movement of gazes, and the length of silences. I pick up these details and organize what kind of "candidate explanations" an event generates, taking into account national institutions, family, gender, and the media environment.

What is important here is not to reduce things to a binary choice of "religion is strong/weak." If you continue to assert things from only one perspective, the world looks simple. But in exchange, you overlook other possibilities, and the discussion ends up sounding like a profession of faith. Academia is the endeavor of producing the "best for now," which can be updated tomorrow. Therefore, I repeatedly perform the task of laying out multiple logics and comparing which one is better based on evidence.

Another pillar of my work is translation. When transferring Arabic religious expressions into Japanese, even if the dictionary meaning is correct, the sense of "piety" or "distance" can sometimes shift. I analyze what is lost and what is added in the process, and provide guidelines for different translation approaches depending on the purpose (for whom and for what).

In my classes, I explain aspects of Arabic and Arabic-speaking regions that are not reported in the news. In seminars, we pause and analyze short scenes, considering interpretations through discussion. We read papers, but rather than "memorizing the conclusion," we examine the "pathway leading to the conclusion." Even for those studying law or politics, grasping "how society is narrated" makes the way rules are perceived more three-dimensional.

Ultimately, the starting point of research is always a familiar "Why?" Learning various things at university is also a form of "intellectual savings" that you never know when you might need in the future. Through the practice of reading society from images and words, let's work together to create your own "better explanations."

(Published: April 2026)