Gender metaphor is a tool for evaluating value indicators in the linguistic picture of the world

Abstract

Metaphors are one of the main ways to evaluate and preserve distinctive features and images in national culture. The term gender metaphor, used in gender linguistics, is a way to convey feminine and masculine traits and personality qualities. In this study, through the analysis of gender-labeled metaphors in the Kazakh language, the image of a man and a woman is investigated. The work, based on the theory of conceptual metaphor, reveals gender specificity in the value fragment of the Kazakh language picture of the world. The 15-volume “Dictionary of the Kazakh literary language” is taken as the main source. The purpose of this study is to prove that gender metaphors are an important cultural language category and a universal mechanism for expressing evaluative meaning by identifying gender characteristics of masculinity and femininity in the behavior, appearance of men and women, which are manifested in the system of gender metaphors, to consider the presence of gender-marked asymmetry in the system of metaphorical nominations of a person with the definition of his value fragment. The article finds out which metaphorical nominations reflect the qualities, characteristics of a man and a woman, and determines what evaluative value makes sense in it. Based on this, an analysis of the evaluation activity of the gender metaphor as a cultural and linguistic category is carried out. As a result, after analyzing the materials of the normative picture of the world in the aspect of gender asymmetry, it is noted that there are differences in the characteristics of men and women: in the evaluation of men, the indicator of ethical evaluation prevails, in the characteristics of women, the indicator of aesthetic evaluation prevails. By this, it is concluded that the gender metaphor is an important linguistic tool in determining value indicators in the linguistic picture of the world.