denpasar中英文化下颜色词的不同涵义 文献综述

2021年1月19日发(作者：微型面包车)

Literature Review
C10
英语（
1
）

张威


We are living in a colorful world where there is a variety of colors permeating every
area of our daily life. Color itself is an abstract concept and Color terms are the labels and
basic
color
terms
are
the
prototypes
in
the
different
color
categories.
Basic
color
terms,
magic
in
expression,
are
the
cultural
carriers
of
different
languages.
It
is
clear
that
each
progress of research is closely linked with human civilization. Color terms form a special
group
of
glossary
and
the
special
quality
of
color
term
has
been
attracting
scholars
from
home and abroad.
Research
on
color
terms
in
foreign
countries
can
go
back
to
the
ancient
Greece
and
mainly
centered
in
philosophy.
In
the
17
th

century,
with
the
emerge
of
natural
science,
people
studied
color
and
color
terms
in
physics
and
optics.
In
the
18
th

century,
the
development
of
philosophy
gave
rise
to
the
aesthetic
study
of
color
words.
In
the
19
th

century, the rise of cultural study laid solid foundation for contrasting and comparing color
terms
from
a
cross-cultural
perspective.
From
the
last
century
until
now,
the
linguists’
participation made the notions of the universality of language principles highly valued and
accepted in
the system
of color terms.
In the recent thirty
years, with the development
of
neurology,
biogenetics,
cognitive
science
and
cognitive
psychology,
people
are
unveiling
the
complicated
relationship
in
the
color
terms’

system,
which
contributes
to
better
understanding of the internal and external systems of color words and to further the study of
linguistic color terms.


1. Studies on Color in Different Fields in Western Countries
Basic Color Terms: Their Universality and Evolution
by Berlin and Kay suggest that
the expression of
“basic color term
s
” does not have
a unique operational definition, yet they
lay out
four basic criteria to
judge whether a
color word is
basic or not.
In the early 20
th

century, E. Sapir and B.L. Wholf put forword Language Relative Theory, then Bloomfield
carried out Culture Contact Theory, both of which offered a foundation for studying color
terms
in
the
frame
of
language
and
culture.
Influenced
by
Berlin
and
Kay’s
publication,

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basic color terms theory has resulted in
great
achievements in
cross-discipline researches.
Berlin
and
Kay
argue
that
basic
color
terms
in
all
languages
are
drawn
from
a
universal
inventory of just 11 color categories. According to their theory, every language has between
2and 11 basic color terms and they present a hierarchy which specifies a limited number of
evolutionary paths that a language can take when adding new color categories.





It points out that among so many color words, we need to find out basic color terms and
do research on these color terms. The crucial thing for us to do is to study the differences
between basic color terms in Chinese and English culture.


The Study of Colors
by Goethe, the noted literary giant, believes that shades of color in
nature
are
related
to
the
sensory
attitudes
of
human
beings.
Then,
he
finds
that
color
categories are processed by the human mind (learned, remembered, denoted and evolved in
languages)
in
terms
of
their
internal
structure.
Based
on
the
results
of
experiments
and
relevant studies, he claims that different psychological states of feeling can be activated by
different colors in terms of warmness and coldness. He thinks the colors on the plus side are
yellow, red-yellow (orange), yellow-red (minimum, cinnabar). The feelings they excite are
quickly, lively. The colors on the minus side are blue, red-blue and blue-red.
It
is
showing
that
knowing
the
different
meanings
of
color
words
tend
to
be
knowledgeable in other field. It makes us concern things in full perspectives which attribute
to make the paper convectively.

Cross-cultural
Investigation
of
Color
Terms

by
Magnus
in
1880,
states
that
color
terms from informants representing different cultures in many parts of the world. He holds
an assumption that color terms are linguistically relative and semantically culture-specific.
The evidence for this assumption in linguistics or semantics is the fact that there is only a
few
number
of
basic
color
terms,
which
are
believed
to
represent
a
higher
degree
of
abstraction
and
generality.
The
new
theoretical
disputes
about
color
terminology,
and
support the existence of an evolutionary feature in color words by suggesting that primitive
people, being in a less developed stages of their color vocabulary, and industrialized people
do not have an identical color-sense.

2

It
changes
people
’
s
view
of
the
relationship
between
color
terminologies
and
their
physiological foundations, and some how predicted the possibility of linguistic universality
in color terms.


The Study of the Color Lexicon
by Lakoff in 1973, claims that women are more likely
than men to use
“
fancy
”
or elaborated color words such as mauve, lavender, and beige in
English. The sociolinguistic study of the color lexicon can be feasibly taken as being in a
complimentary distribution with the completely examined in the sense that both basic and
elaborated color terms are studied, and most important of all, the relationships between the
subjects
’

language
performance
and
possible
social
implications
are
taken
into
account.

Color words can not only describe the objective view and the thing, it also has the very stron
g moral effect, gives the abstract things and character, color, make expression added image
of the figurative meaning. The color of simple to admire the orders of the characters of subli
mation to conduct image expression is the language of the unique function of color words. E
specially in cross-cultural communication because of different nationalities, life characteristi
cs, psychological activities, emotion, in different degree, was given the cultural information
connotation.
All
mention
above
about
color
abroad
laid
a
solid
foundation
for
future
study.
Meanwhile,
they
also
give
significant
suggestions
and
insights
to
our
relative
research
at
home.


2. Studies on Color in Different Fields in Chinese Culture

Onomatopoeia Words & Color Terms and Their Translation
by Zhang Peiji in 1964,
makes
a
detailed
description
of
the
usage
of
almost
all
the
English
color
terms
and
their
translation. In China, people perceived several colors and produced as many color terms as
possible
because
of
the
development
of
dying
and
pottery
industries.
Since
the
May
4th
Movement of 1919, more and more Chinese scholars have carried out the studies on color
terms but in the early time the study still focused on the Chinese color terms. As early as in
the
1940s,
literature
and
exegesis
experts
have
already
analyzed
the
production
and
development of five color words in ancient Chinese characters
—
white, vermilion, yellow,

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black, green. He makes a detailed description of the usage of almost all the
English color
terms and their translation.

All in all, it lets me know the study of color terms in China, and makes me clearly to
compare with these different meanings of color words between China and English.

Probing
Into
Fuzzy
Language

and

Re-probing
Into
Fuzzy

Language

by
Wu
Tieping introduces the concept of fuzzy language, in which color terms as a phenomenon of
fuzzy language drew the attention of scholars. Later, many scholars conducted researches by
comparing
the
color
terms
between
Chinese
and
other
languages,
aiming
at
finding
the
differences in language and culture and contributing to the intercultural communication. The
study on color terms went further and reached its peak in the 1990s. the relationship of color
terms and culture can be said that culture and language are connected and interwoven with
each other. On one hand, color terms function as the carrier of culture and culture is loaded
in color terms, through which the material developments, institutional systems, conceptual
features
and
the
like
of
a
certain
society
are
recorded,
expressed
and
transmitted.
On
the
other
hand,
color
terms
is
considerably
got
influenced
and
therefore,
formed
by
culture
while it also fully reflects culture.
It provides me some useful mastery in color words, which helps me a lot in my paper
writing. With large materiel, the paper can be a sense of fulfillment.

On the Theories of Basic Color Terms
:
The Evolution of Chinese Basic Color Terms
(1988)

by
Yao
Xiaoping
shows
a
summary
of
the
theories
of
basic
color
terms,
giving
a
review
of
the
development
of
basic
color
terms.
He
studies
of
color
words
at
home
and
abroad are conducted mainly in the following areas: (1) color terms in philosophy; (2) the
quantity
of
basic
color
words
and
its
order
in
different
languages;
(3)
semantic
study
on
color words; (4) the study of grammar, rhetoric and cultural meaning on color words; (5) the
comparative study on translation and cultural meaning of color words. He puts forward three
conditions that must be satisfied in perceiving colors
—
a light source, an object that reflects
the
light,
and
a
functional
eye
that
can
receive
the
reflected
light.
In
his
opinion,
simple
colors
related
to
some
basic
elements
in
the
physical
world
and
the
nature
of
colors
is

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