I had an idea that my comments on color terms would stir up a lot of
discussion! This is something almost everyone can talk about. Some responses:
Yes, the RHS color chart is valuable, and I am going to buy one, but only
because I can call it a business expense; as several correspondents
remarked, it is quite expensive. However, a reference tool of this kind is
valuable only to the extent that its users' readers have access to it. If I
write that a flower is no. 187 on the RHS chart, only readers who have the
chart will benefit from that information. Those who don't will be
(momentarily) bored or annoyed. That's how editors have to think.
There is at least one book on the subject of color terms and their
cross-linguistic taxonomy: Brent Berlin and Paul Kay, "Basic color terms:
Their universality and evolution" (Univ of California Press, 1969).
Semanticists have also turned their eyes to folk biological classification,
by the way. Berlin & Kay's conclusions have been modified to some extent by
subsequent researchers and by Berlin's later work.
Susan Hayek wrote,
>*And I believe, when I was teaching spec ed, somewhere I had a workshop
on cultural >differences/languages and learned that in some native American
cultures there was only one >word which meant warm colors and one word for
cool. "Warm" and "cool", of course, may mean >different things in different
language/cultures.
I think this is one of those folk-linguistic myths that originate in
misinterpretations by journalists or other nonspecialists, similar to the
myth that there are languages where it's impossible to count beyond three
(a misinterpretation arising from verb number, apparently), or languages
that have a hundred words for 'snow'. (True, you can make a hundred words
for snow in Inuttitun [Eskimo], which can compound even more lavishly than
German or Classical Greek, but you could make the same words in English if
you really tried.) The Native American languages I studied used the same
device for expanding their color terminology that European languages use,
referencing (perhaps with affixes) the names of common objects that are the
appropriate color, such as 'rose', 'turquoise', and 'gold'.
Jim Waddick wrote,
> Roses are red - you get this response from many people, but isn't the
color 'rose' another distinctly different shade?
Jamie noted that "rosa" in German is pale pink, but "rose" in English tends
to be used for medium to deep pink, i.e. red mixed with white. Most garden
roses, however, are either blue-pink or yellow-pink, as you will find when
you try to mix them in arrangements. I think Eng. "rose" is rather a
blue-pink, but not as blue as "mauve."
Jim went on,>and Violets are neither blue or rarely violet, but more often
purple, yellow, etc.
"Purple" is a difficult term in English. For many people it's synonymous
with "violet." Some people take the Classical view of "purple," which would
make it a blue-red, while others shift their definition more toward the
spectrum color indigo, a slightly reddish blue. If you lean toward the
former, "purple" and "violet" (the latter is the spectrum term) are
synonyms. I tend to write "violet" rather than "purple" for this color
range. As for the colors of Viola spp., these range from near-blue to
near-red, offering no help. If, as Mary Sue suggested, we discuss favorite
purple-flowered bulbs, we may see how far people's field for "purple"
extends, and we may hash out "lavender," "lilac," and so on.
We may even agree on a cutoff point for "blue," which plant catalog
copywriters toss around so freely, as Mary Sue mentioned. The photos she
cites are probably Photoshopped to create a more colorful page layout.
There are really blue crocuses, but they're light blue (C. abantensis, C.
baytopiorum) or the blue is mostly in the external markings (C.
leichtlinii), and you'll never find any of them in a mass-market bulb
catalog. Regarding capturing blue in digital photographs, I think this
depends on your camera. My Nikon Coolpix seems to do a good job with this
(almost as good as Fuji Astria slide film), but I recently viewed the
submissions for the NARGS photo contest and noted that certain
photographers were having trouble with their blues (either because their
cameras didn't capture the color right, or because they had tried
unsuccessfully to enhance the colors), while others sent in photos of
flowers in the blue range that appeared quite true to me. (I'm not a
photography expert, but I have an unusually acute visual memory, including
for colors.)
Jim mentioned more specialized color words ("lilacs, pinks, orchid,
primrose, cerise (from the french for 'cherry'), and John Ingram also
commented on these. Many of these words entered English in the 18th and
19th centuries when fabric dyes diversified greatly (as Sheila noted, mauve
resulted from a dye chemist's work in that period). Many such words were
imported from French because it was the language of high fashion -- hence
"cerise" and "puce," and "mauve" which is the French word for a flower,
mallow or Malva. "Aqua," or pale greenish blue, mentioned by John, is a
fashion color term innovated directly in English but taken from Latin.
Sorry to go on so long! Must write something about the bulbs now.
Jane McGary
Northwestern Oregon, USA