This article offers a cultural-anthropological analysis of ethnomedical knowledge among the Kazakh diaspora in Turkey. It aims to identify the internal cognitive structure of  ethnomedicine (its cultural logic), the mechanisms that sustain it as a cultural code, and its principal social functions within a diasporic context.

Drawing on the case of the Kazakh diaspora, the study examines five key functions of ethnomedical knowledge: as a system of knowledge, a cultural text, a social institution, a mechanism of adaptation, and a means of preserving ethnic identity. The analysis is based on materials collected by the author since 1996, complemented by multi-sited fieldwork conducted between 2022 and 2024 among Kazakh communities in Turkey and Western Europe. The theoretical framework integrates perspectives from medical anthropology, cultural memory studies, and diaspora studies.

The findings indicate that folk medicine constitutes a dynamic cultural system responsive to historical and social transformations. In diasporic settings, it operates as a survival strategy, a mode of social organization, and a vehicle for maintaining cultural memory and ethnic identity. The study also highlights its gradual transformation from a set of practical healing practices into a domain of cultural memory.