The concept “KIMONO” in figurative units of the Japanese language

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to describe Japanese phraseological units and lexemes with figurative meanings as a fragment of the lexical-phraseological system of the Japanese language, to identify the images underlying their formation, and to study their linguistic and cultural characteristics. The material for the work is the data from the dictionaries of the Japanese language, in which figurative units connected with the nominations of the types and details of kimono are recorded. The research is based on the linguacultural approach, which identifies linguistic units with national-cultural semantics, reflecting national and specific vision of the world on the lexical-phraseological level. Semanticthematic analysis allowed us to identify four groups of the most frequent lexemes, representing the concept “kimono”, on the basis of which phraseological units were formed. The group of figurative units, which do not include the names of kimono or its details, but which implicitly refer to this concept, was also examined. The etymological analysis revealed the cognitive basis for the formation of phraseological units and the mechanism of metaphorization of these lexical units. From the whole considered corpus of language units, the most representative are gesture phraseological units formed on the basis of idiomaticization of gesture units. The second largest group consisted of phraseological units derived from the clearly regulated ritual and rules of putting on and wearing kimono. They reflect the aesthetic views of the Japanese about the ideal image of kimono. The method of quantitative analysis allowed us to confirm the significance of the concept “kimono” as a symbol of Japanese culture and to reveal its phraseological productivity. A large number of figurative language units, related to kimono, indicates that this concept has pronounced culturally marked characteristics, reflects special models of worldview and stereotypes of behavior. The considered language units require special attention to the cultural context in which they function. The study of figurative meanings of words nominating kimono parts, as well as stable combinations, created on their basis, allows expressing the cultural information they contain. The concept “kimono” is one of the most important constants of Japanese culture, so its study from the position of cultural linguistics is extremely relevant.