Cultural-Semantic Structure of Traditional Kazakh Clothing Names: Evidence From the Cultural-Representative Subcorpus of the Kazakh Language
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: Traditional Kazakh clothing names constitute an important component of national culture and serve as indicators of social relations, cultural values, and the worldview of the Kazakh people. This study examines the frequency structure, taxonomic organization, cultural-semantic functions, and gender-related characteristics of traditional clothing names based on data from the Cultural-Representative Subcorpus of the Kazakh Language. A total of 26 traditional clothing names were selected for analysis. Each item was examined according to its frequency of occurrence and further analyzed through a cultural-semantic coding procedure. The analysis employed several cultural parameters, including gender association, ritual function, social status, protective function, seasonal use, everyday use, and connection with nomadic life. The frequency analysis revealed that oramal (scarf), ton (fur coat), shapan (robe), borik (fur cap), and ishik (fur garment) are among the most frequently occurring clothing names in the corpus. Taxonomic analysis demonstrated the predominance of outerwear and headwear categories within the traditional Kazakh clothing system. Hierarchical cluster analysis identified three major cultural groups of clothing names: everyday-social clothing, protective-climatic clothing, and ritual-gender-specific clothing. Furthermore, the gender analysis showed that all clothing items associated with ritual functions are linked exclusively to female social identity and life-cycle transitions. The findings demonstrate that traditional clothing names represent a significant system of cultural signs reflecting the social organization, cultural experience, and national worldview of the Kazakh people. The study contributes to research in ethnolinguistics, corpus linguistics, and digital humanities while highlighting the scientific potential of the Cultural-Representative Subcorpus as a resource for investigating ethnocultural knowledge and cultural semantics.
Institution: L. N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University
Language: English
Topic: Language and Culture
Subfield: Linguistics and Language
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W7225252112