The Multidimensional Description and Investigation of New Color Terms: A Metaphorical Cognitive Approach

Yang Wenquan, Li Yuanyuan

The Multidimensional Description and Investigation of New Color Terms: A Metaphorical Cognitive Approach

Yang Wenquan, Li Yuanyuan*

This article studies the new color terms in Chinese. It first classifies the color terms from four linguistic aspects: pronunciation, grammar, semantics, linguistic context and the theory of “Four Worlds,” namel, language, physics, culture, and psychology. It then summarizes all the characteristics of the new color terms. The study takes questionnaires as supplementary data, explores and proves the interactive relationship between metaphorical expression and cognitive psychology of new color words. The life span of such new color terms is also discussed.

new color terms, characteristics, metaphorical expression, cognitive psychology, life span of new terms

New color terms refer to colors such as pearl white, soft pink, fresh golden, knight grey, elegant purple, safari green, Jay silver, IBM black, Mediterranean blue, Bordeaux red, fragrant cocoa and sweet mango, which are widely used in the emerging industries of mobile phones, laptops, digital products, automobiles, garments, beauty, home decoration, household appliances and online shopping items. Originating from the traditional color terms in the modern Chinese vocabulary, new color terms are a form of traditional color terms with special features in structural, semantic and pragmatic aspects such as “deviant color terms” or “special color terms.” For nomination convenience, this paper calls these words “new colorterms.” Although they are marginalized as “new members” in the color word family, new color terms have wider and wider application and scope. They are well worthy of research and attention. These new words are the reflection of the developments of our times and changes in our language. The research and organization of developing new color terms not only expand the research perspective of traditional color terms, but also has great significance in enriching and constructing the modern Chinese vocabulary and theoretical connotations. Consequently, we believe that in addition to conducting research from the conventional perspectives of structure, semantics and features, we should also explore the mutual relationships between the metaphorical expression and cognitive psychology, social recognition and survival ability of the new color terms from the aspects of the creative communications of advertising writers and production and marketing businessmen, and the information feedback of the public.

1. Application, Classifications and Features of New Color Terms

1.1 Application of new color terms

With wide practical applications, new color terms can be found freely in advertising and other texts of emerging industries. Just take some examples as follows (abridged from the original texts):

(1) Although made of metal, the elegant silver and black iron of Panda GM800 are impressive... Besides, GM988 “quicksand golden,” EMOL98 sunrise golden and Nokia 6108 metallic copper interpret metal shell anew with impressive bright and remarkable elegance... TCL elegant pearl black interprets eternal classic silently in the material world. While the pearl white of Rover 8388“Starlight” shines gracefully… Fresh and flexible blue of Siemens 2128, immemorial and brilliant glacial blue of Motorola v70, deep and serene sea blue, refined and noble space blue and sky blue of Soutech T600...

(Zhao Yazhou, Li Xuxia. Feast of Mobile Phone Colors,Yangcheng Evening News, July 16, 2003)

(2) At present, lots of new colors of mobile phone shells appear in the same form, such as; seabed grey, aurora silver, mirror blue, night black, Milky Way white, sand beach golden, cosmos blue, moonlight white, Mars red, night blue, sunrise golden, starlight silver, pearl white, night grey, elegant golden, midsummer blue, snow silver, sea blue, champagne golden, amber yellow, red touched with violet gold, diamond black, star black, glass yellow, Milky Way grey, ruby red, sky silver…Besides, there are colors full of imagination, such as; pure white, blue silver, lovesick silver, jazz blue, rock purple, Latin yellow, Maya silver, Athens black, passion purple, auspicious yellow, phantom black, free blue, prosperous red, and platonic red. Not just mobile phones but automobiles also use new colors, for example; jazz blue, emission silver, imaginary green, candy white, Flan red, Mocha blue, Indigo blue, and many others.

(He Guowei. Colors of Mobile Phones,Xinmin Evening News Weekly, May 14, 2007)

(3) Painted on thick Xuan Paper (a kind of paper for traditional Chinese painting and calligraphy), Yang Zhiwan’s lotus is the oil painting with the hierarchical sense of space of western oil painting, as well as the elegance and freehand brushwork of Chinese literati’s painting. Her paintings often have no names, or are just named “flower” or“lotus pond.” The paintings are divided into groups according to different colors, such as rose red, carmine, bright pink, peacock blue, sapphire, acid blue, lemon yellow, light yellow, fresh green, and decadent purple.

(Manor. Yang Zhiwan: Lotus Aloof from the World, heep://wxs.zhongwenlink.com/home/news_ read.asp? NewsID = 11667)

(4)ican select postures freely, the nervous orange is exaggerated/ijust revolt, never care about your praise/ Your bottom line is the limit, or determined to accompany me/ Spring scenery is limited, schemes are limitless/ican become radiant and enchanting for you for one night… decadent purple is exceedingly beautiful, it feels poetic/ Happiness stops here in memory, and you can have a try/ The change of hair color is a suggestion, there are infinite conceptions/ It’s easy and never too late to see through/This city expects originality.

(Guan Xinyan. A Clockwork Orange)

In cases (1) and (2), new color terms are used to remark or describe the colors of products; and identify and refer to color in case (3). In case (4),“nervous orange” and “decadent purple” are used to describe human moods.

The colorful world is abundant in color terms, such as; “elegant purple” of the Gepson PVC yoga mat, “ivory white” of L’Oreal True Match perfect liquid foundation, “obsessive purple” of Avon duotone eye shadow, “brilliant black” and “brilliant white” of Motorola mobile phone VE75, “knight grey” of ZTE mobile phone G800B, “active golden”of Haier mobile phone V80GSM,“pearl white,”“sapphire,” “night sky black” and “lovely pink” of Samsung laptop NC10, “champagne golden,” “agate black,” “coral red,” “moonlight white” of Sony laptop VGN–TT, “metallic silver” of Toshiba laptop Portété R500,“moonlight silver,” “vanilla white,”“warm golden brown,” “dawn purple,” “deep sea blue,” “mint green,” “sakura pink” of Canon digital camera Power Shot, “silent black,” “passion red,”“dazzling golden,” “elegant silver,” “crystal blue,”“gemstone pink,” “amber golden,” “pearl silver,”“peach pink,” “azure blue,” “mist silver,” “crescent silver,” “sunglow golden,” “sunglow pink,” “autumn night blue” and “faraway mountain brown①The above product types, brands (models), product colors are collected by the author. Readers can check related products on the official website.” of IXUS series. All of a sudden, we find that mobile phones, laptops, digital products,②The“digital products”here refer to the products such as walkman, MP3, MP4, digital camera, video camera, recording pen, etc, except mobile phone and laptop.automobiles, garments, beauty products, home decorations, household appliances, online shopping and other emerging industries have countless③According to the incomplete statistics of Analysis of Mobile Phone Color Words (master’s degree thesis of Hunan Normal University) written by Wang Chengjing (2007), until May 2006, such new color terms reached 550~600. According to the preliminary statistics of Liu Hui (2008), there were over 600 abstract color words with three syllables. Teng Li (2008) found 1123 new color words.new color terms. 90% of Motorola’s mobile phones are named by new color terms (Wang Chengjin, 2007). Among 115 AMOI mobile phones collected in Mobile Web, 75 types use new color terms (Qiu Liqin, 2008). Consequently, new color terms are used very widely with high application frequency which should win attention and research from academia.

1.2 Classifications of new color terms

First, in phonological and grammatical aspects, new color terms have disyllables and multi–syllables; in internal constitution, they are mainly compounding words and belong to modifier–core structures.④Except modifier–core structure, some new color terms are paratactic structure, such as “autumn maple and red leaf” and “blue sea and azure sky.” Due to less quantity, the color terms with four syllables, such as “Alpine white, Alaska green, Royal Navy blue and platinum sapphire,” are not classified.The new color terms with a modifier–core structure can be divided into five types: A. color terms of noun morpheme modifying color morpheme (such as smoke purple, ice red, snow silver, rock grey, pearl white, titanium golden, knightgrey, glass golden, Capricorn black, clove purple, lavender purple, Mediterranean blue, Indian red, taffeta white); B. color terms of adjective morpheme modifying color morpheme (such as elegant silver, eminent blue, noble red, dazzling golden, cool grey, soft pink, brilliant black, bright white, deep blue, elegant purple, romantic pink, cool silver, psychedelic golden, erudite black, calm grey, cold red, mysterious purple); C. color terms of verb morpheme modifying color morpheme (such as floating golden, falling grey, frozen white, hiding black, dancing white, thinking grey, discoloring purple, flashing black, burning golden, hunting green, winning golden, popular purple, reflecting silver); D. achromatic morpheme with color morpheme ahead and modified description behind (such as blue flame, pink grape, red mushroom, yellow jade, silver spirit, blue elegance, black tercel and sapphire maze), serving as symbolization and metaphor functions; E. modifier–core structure without color morpheme (such as fragrant cocoa and sweet mango), the tenor is hidden, the whole modifier–core structure is the vehicle. Tenor and vehicle jointly constitute the complete connotation of abstract color terms [such as fragrant cocoa (tenor)→natural deep brown (vehicle)].

The noun morpheme of modifier–core color terms can be divided into three types: A. abstract noun (such as gentleman black, charm silver, affectionate brown, lover pink, magic black, digital silver, hometown white, intervention golden, temperament white, refined taste grey, charm purple and vigor orange). B. common noun (a. tenors are natural scenery, such as “dawn blue, desert golden, crescent white, Milky Way grey, firmament blue, hazy pink, polar white, rising sun red and seduction red. B. tenors are minerals, such as gem red, crystal yellow, metallic orange, rock brown, glass golden, diamond black, mineral black.c. tenors are animals, such as horse racing red, lion golden, mink black, peacock blue, firefly yellow and fox white. d. tenors are plants, such as Chinese redbud red, maple red, rose pink, vanilla white, daisy blue, forest black and clove purple. e. tenors are food, beverage or daily necessities, such as fruit pink, champagne golden, coffee golden, ceramic white, satin silver, velvet blue and brocade white. f. tenors are other things, such as piano black, ivory white, bronze black and castle silver). C. proper nouns consisting of place names, manufacturers names or brand names (such as Winsor red, Fuji white, Rhine grey, Chinese red, Athens red, South Africa red, France blue and Mitsubishi red).

Compared to traditional color terms, new color terms have foreign morphemes. Achromatic morphemes modifying color terms derive from these foreign morphemes by means of transliteration, free translation, transliteration & free translation. Besides, foreign morphemes create words directly, such as Jay black, Jay silver, Ink blue, Titan silver, Dream purple and IBM black.

Second, in semantic aspects, new color terms can be divided into realistic new color terms and abstract new color terms, which can be investigated from the semantic orientation and function of achromatic morphemes.

The achromatic semantic orientation of realistic new color terms is color morphemes and the semantic function is to identify, allege and describe colors as well as deliver color information. Achromatic morphemes have natural colors, such as peach blossom pink, flame red, grass green, snow white, moonlight silver, sea blue and night black.

The achromatic semantic orientation of abstract new color terms is not color but various products and consumers. The semantic function does not lie in describing or transferring color information, but in publicizing products and attaching consumers’attention. Specifically, it can be divided into three types:

(1) Semantic orientation to advertising products and semantic function in publicizing product features to consumers and highlighting product quality. ① Semantic orientation lies in the top–ranking quality or design style, such as classic black, eternal white and everlasting green. ② Semantic orientation to the overall impression of the product made on people or pointing out product category, such as auspicious red, prosperous red, sci–fiblue, fantastic purple, digital silver, rock yellow and blue grey.

(2) Semantic orientation to guiding potential consumers purchasing products and semantic function in evaluating consumers’ features or desirable characteristics positively from different aspects, including: ①semantic orientation to human character, preference or feelings, such as willful silver, cool golden, calm black, generous grey, gentle purple and innocent white.② Semantic orientation to human appearance or expression, such as handsome grey, beautiful silver, pretty red and lovely pink.③ Semantic orientation to human temperament, cultivation and manner, such as elegant purple, sage blue, erudite black. ④ Semantic orientation to human achievement, such as victory red, success silver and triumph golden. ⑤ Semantic orientation to life attitude and behavior principle, such as unfettered blue, free silver and ego red.⑥ Semantic orientation to those people in the realistic, virtual world, such as lover pink, imperial concubine red, knight grey, conqueror black, knight silver, angel white, noble yellow and duke purple.

(3) Semantic orientation to products and consumers. The achromatic morphemes have semantic functions of positively evaluating product features and characteristics reflected by consumers after using the products. ① Semantic orientation to product appearance and features after having used the products, such as dazzling silver, bright golden, gorgeous red and splendid yellow.② Semantic orientation to product style, design features as well as style features or overall feelings consumers have after using products, such as noble red, fresh green, romantic blue, noble purple, elegant silver, fashion golden, vigor orange and graceful white.

Third, there is another type of new color term called context abstract color terms. In specific context–advertisement design and copy, context abstract color terms emphasize and explain the existing color terms to highlight color and product features, which play an important role in advertisement publicity. For example, in Garnier hair dying and care products, “red hot chili pepper–light reddish brown,” “fragrant cocoa–natural deep brown” and “sweet mango–deep brass golden”are shown in color pattern position. The colors of abstract color terms “red hot chili pepper, fragrant cocoa and sweet mango” are highlighted. Since “red hot chili pepper” associate with an enthusiastic and passionate personality, its passion temperament is endowed with the context color meaning of “light reddish brown.” (Teng Li, 2008)

Besides, new color terms are not only related to objective colors and verbal signs, but also connect with society, culture and psychology. According to the “four worlds” theory of Wang Xijie,①“Four worlds” in General Discourse of Rhetoric written by Wang Xijie (1996) refer to linguistic world, physical world, cultural world and psychological world.new color terms can be divided into the following three types (Wang Chengjing, 2007):

(1) New color terms from the physical world. These terms use concrete and tangible items to represent abstract colors, such as maple red, sky silver, wing grey, moon shadow white, lion golden and dawn blue.

(2) New color terms from the cultural world.These terms represent national cultural traditions, local customs and practices and human thinking habits or cultural concepts, such as auspicious red, prosperous red, noble red, reduction red, imperial concubine red, gentleman black, conqueror black, bronze black, brocade white, shusu red, ceramic green, Milky Way silver and spirit blue.

(3) New color terms from the psychological world. Colors in the physical world correspond to different feeling tendencies in the psychological world. Colors have an emotional influence on people, affect the strength and tension of feelings, suggest moral quality and material nature. Meanwhile, colors have cold and warm, light and heavy, rising and shrinking, contrast and comparison, fashion, taste and smell association effects (Wang Yanfang, 1999). Moreover, new color terms have many words created by the relations between color and mind, such as happy orange, passionate red, cold silver, fresh green, seductive purple, fantastic blue, profound black, flexible blue, leisure white, free blue and bold blue.

1.3 Features of new color terms

From the above analysis, three–syllable words are the most common in new color terms, then followed by disyllabic words and a small quantity of four–syllable words. From the perspective of internal structure of words, new color terms are mainly modifier–core structures and the syntagmatic of constitution is a modifying or modified relation. The center word is the basic color word, marking the color category. Modifiers can modify and restrict the center word, conveying additional information of features, status, scope and nature.

Compared to traditional Chinese color terms, some new color terms have no morphemes representing color, which is different from traditional color terms concluded with “color,” basic color words or words made of derivations and affix. In terms of modifiers, most modifiers in traditional color words are noun morphemes expressing concrete matter or color. Except for concrete matter nouns, modifiers of new color terms have lots of abstract nouns and even foreign morphemes. Moreover, as the object of color, traditional color terms basically have no feelings. While, due to modifiers, most new color terms have commendatory feelings such as elegance, calmness and classics, which attach strong color meaning to neutral color words (Qiu Liqin, 2008). Besides, using metaphor and association word creation is the outstanding feature of new color terms. Compared to metaphorical word creation of traditional colors, the metaphorical objects of new color terms are more innovative and varied. The reference range of color expands and expression becomes more colorful. In summary, new color terms have the following features:

First, the morpheme collocation is “random.”Namely, random word creation and free combination with unreasonable but marvelous fuzziness. One color can be modified by different modifiers; one modifier can modify different colors, which makes it difficult for us to understand new color terms as traditional color words. However, the random morpheme collocation results in fuzziness and uncertainty of visual image, expands imagination space, enlarges information content, represents rich semantic connotations and implicit language styles.

Second, the semantic structure is “subjective”(Shen Jiaxuan, 2001). Namely, humanization, emotions and subjective objectification. New color terms mainly consist of color morphemes and words expressing human personality, feelings, wishing for good luck and prosperity. The terms have strong personification color, such as charming silver emphasizing that the color has attraction like humans and tends to generate intimacy psychologically (Liu Feng, 2005). The objectification word creation feature of new color terms appeals to different groups powerfully. For example, frank green, vigororange, cool silver and love pink are targeted at young consumers aged 18–30 who are chasing fashion and personality; brilliant blue, manner black, gentle purple and charming red are targeted at consumers with good education aged 30–40; king black, noble silver, triumph golden and excellent white are targeted at successful people aged above 40; and eternal white, classic green, simple black and prosperous red are oriented at different product features. The pragmatic communicative effects of these subjective, personalized and diversified new color terms are incomparable to traditional color words.

Third, the pragmatic expression is “novel.”Namely, fashionable and novel, elegant rather than vulgar, full of time color. In the unprecedented developed modern civilized society, fashion, seeking to be different, breaking with convention and creating new style are the objects pursued modern people, especially young people. New color terms pursue novelty and originality in linguistic form, consciously deconstruct the universality of conceptual cognition, expand cognition distance to seek defamiliarization effects and offer people novel and fresh aesthetic stimulation and language sense, which is the embodiment of modern features. Consequently, words like dazzling, cool, fantastic, elegant, active, vigor, romantic and passionate are popular among the young and become word creation morphemes in new color terms. Compared to conventional traditional color words, they are novel, creative, special and fashionable.

2. Interactive Relationships between Metaphorical Expression and Psychological Cognition of New Color Terms

Why do new color terms exist? Is their existence inevitable or occasional? Are they unfailing or a flash in the pan? Are they viable? We believe that an interactive relationship between metaphorical expression and psychological cognition of new color terms exists, which may explain the above problems to some extent. Then, what is the relationship and how can it be found and proved?

First, the interactive theory of Edward Twitchell Hall Jr, founder of American intercultural communications research, suggests that “interaction is a function of living in groups.” (Feng Guangyi, 1999) Verbal communications is taken under the interaction of expresser and receiver. Interaction is the dialectic relationship between expresser and receiver during verbal communications. Concretely, during verbal communications, expression and reception are opposite and will have give–and–take relationship reversions under the influence of rhetorical interactions (Feng Guangyi, 1999), which is shown as follows:

Verbal expresser A1(verbal receiver A2)

verbal receiver B1(verbal expresser B2)

This shows that when verbal expresser A1(actor) delivers rhetoric discourse to verbal receiver B1(receiver), as long as B1receives the discourse, corresponding reception psychology will come into being; specific reception psychology can be fed back to A1through the discourse constructed by B1 and further affect the rhetorical expression of A1. Meanwhile, when A1receives the feedback discourse, he becomes the receiver of “B1,”namely verbal receiver A2(Zhang Chunquan, 2007). Consequently, B1 becomes expresser and A1becomes receiver. Verbal communications is finished during the constant reversion of this give–and–take relationship.

Besides, new color terms have plenty of metaphorical expressions. Lu Jianming, and other scholars (2004:355–357) believed that “the action to ‘project’ a concept in some field to another field is called ‘metaphor’.” Paul Ricoeur (1913–2005),a famous French thinker believed that similarity was a “tie” of metaphor and played a key role in metaphor (Xie Zhijun, 2007:27). “Kinship” is established between seemingly irrelevant matters in common sense and form “category dislocation.”Due to this conscious dislocation, the original classification order is broken. New connections are formed and new meanings are created accordingly.①“Four worlds” in General Discourse of Rhetoric written by Wang Xijie (1996) refer to linguistic world, physical world, cultural world and psychological world.The metaphorical expression of new color terms is reflected in their fuzziness and objectification. Just take “sci–fiblue” and “rock red” as examples. In common sense, “sci–fi” and “rock” have no relation with “blue” and “red.” “Sci–fi” is used as the alternative name of fiction and movie and “rock”refers to music style. When we try to “project” this cognitive concept into new color terms, we can find that “sci–fiblue” and “rock red” can better deliver the information that products have high technological content and appearance is designed dynamically to consumers (Liu Hui, 2008). In the similarity of metaphor, when referring to blue, we will think of sea and sky. Since blue brings people with free, broad and vigorous sense, new color terms of “free blue, unfettered blue, energetic blue and flexible blue” come into being. As the purest color, white embodies purity, simplicity, innocence, detachment and eternity, which is manifested by “pure white, innocent white, simple white, elegant white and eternal white.” Besides, in Chinese culture, “red”always symbolizes auspiciousness, beauty, success and power. These concepts are projected into new color terms of “auspicious red, prosperous red, lucky red, concubine red, seduction red and charming red”to reflect consumers’ consumption psychology of“preferring auspiciousness, newness and elegance”(Zong Tinghu, 1994).

In order to further explore and discuss the mutual relationship between metaphorical expression and psychological cognition of new color terms, we designed two types of questionnaires. How Much Do You Know About New Color Terms (1)(“Questionnaire 1” for short) mainly investigates the psychological cognition degree about new color terms of the public so as to know whether the metaphorical expression of new color terms influences the psychological cognition of the public. How Much Do You Know About New Color Terms (2) (“Questionnaire 2” for short) has two groups, Group A and Group B, respectively targeting advertising marketers, manufacturers, agents, product salesmen and the public to investigate and discuss the influence of psychological cognition on the relation and viability of new color terms. Finally, Questionnaire 1 collected 135 valid questionnaires, and Group A and Group B of Questionnaire 2 respectively collected 50 valid ones. From the statistical analysis of research result, we acquired the following conclusions:

(1) Metaphorical expression of new color terms has positive effect on psychological cognition

Question 1–5 in Questionnaire 1 respectively investigate the public’s overall distribution of cognitive gradients of “king black, cool silver and dancing white” and other new color terms with abstract meanings(Question 1), the new color terms using different modifiers to modify one color (Question 2), the new color terms using one modifier to modify different colors (Question 3), the new color terms using flora and fauna, natural landscapes and minerals as metaphorical objects or consisting of place names, brand names and other proper nouns (Question 4) and the new color terms with four syllables (Question 5).

Among the four options representing cognitivegradients, A cognition degree is the lowest, standing for “Don’t understand; totally no idea”; it means that some people pay no attention to new color terms when purchasing products (the valid participants of Question 1–5 respectively occupy 3%, 4%, 3%, 15% and 10% of the total investigated people). B cognition degree is low, representing “No idea but did not hinder me to purchase the product with new color terms;” it means that these pay equal attention to products with and without new color terms (the valid participants of Question 1–5 respectively occupy 13%, 19%, 16%, 24% and 24%). C cognition degree is high, showing “No idea but preferring the product with new color terms rather than the product with traditional color words and new color terms are the important factor attracting me to buy the product;” it means that these people prefer new color terms to traditional color words (the valid participants of Question 1–5 respectively occupy 12%, 19%, 19%, 16% and 13%). D cognition degree is the highest, standing for “Unable to explain, but understanding it generally. The product with new color terms can better reflect my personality, temperament, identity, favor and living attitude, or show the quality and design style of the purchased product;” it means that the metaphorical expression of new color terms has an influence on these people (the valid participants of Question 1–5 respectively occupy 72%, 58%, 62%, 45% and 53%).

Question 6–10 in Questionnaire 1 respectively investigate the public’s psychological cognition of the relations between morphemes constituting new color terms of “unfettered blue” (Question 6),“dancing white” (Question 7), “sci–fiblue” (Question 8), “rock red” and “blue elegance” (Question 9), “jelly orange” and “dawn blue” (Question 10). Among the four options representing psychological cognition, A believes that the two morphemes before and after these words “Have no connection with difficulty in understanding and deliberate coinage” (the valid participants of Question 6–10 respectively occupy 4%, 15%, 21%, 10% and 12%). B suggests that the two morphemes before and after these words“Have some linkage but the specificity is not strong and randomness is great” (the valid participants of Question 6–10 respectively occupy 29%, 25%, 26%, 27% and 18%). C says that these words “Are poetic, fashionable and have strong inflection” and that “as new words, these terms focus on the innovation of linguistic form, pursue linguistic novelty, concede in the accuracy of semantics. Besides, these new color terms pass cultural and psychological information beyond colors and make no strict identification of colors” (the valid participants of Question 6–10 respectively occupy 54%, 51%, 46%, 56% and 60%). D believes that “New color terms fail to express colors clearly as traditional color words” (the valid participants of Question 6–10 respectively occupy 13%, 9%, 7%, 7% and 10%).

Questionnaire 1 shows that not all new color terms are accepted and recognized by the public. Although the public’s acceptance degrees of new color terms are different, in general, the metaphorical expression of new color terms have positive influence on the psychological cognition of the public. Meanwhile, Questionnaire 1 also reflects that new color terms need to be further standardized and shows the complexity of psychological cognition. Exteriorly, psychological cognition not only includes the psychological cognition of verbal expresser, but also includes the psychological cognition of verbal receiver; interiorly, the psychological cognition of the same group is different. These investigation results are conducive to further revealing the generation and development rules of new color terms.

(2) Psychological cognition affects the formation and development of new color terms

The key point to discuss the influence of psychological cognition on new color terms lies in figuring out how new color terms come into beingand what factors influence their development. In Group A and Group B of Questionnaire 2, two groups (manufacturers and the public) hold various opinions toward the functions and forms of objectified new color terms targeting different consumers and product features (Question 1). Among the five options, A believes “Manufacturers, agents, advertisers and salesmen give full play to inspiration and innovation, aim to create fantastic colors to attract consumers and promote products”(manufactures occupy 28% and the public holds 29%); B thinks “They are personalized and target different consumers to better reflect consumers’personality, temperament, identity, favor and living attitude” (manufacturers are 31% and the public is 28%); C deems that “They are the reflection of advertising effect to better highlight the quality and design style of products” (both manufacturers and the public hold 16%); D considers that “They have no actual meanings, especially vague in the expression of specific colors” (manufacturers are 3% and the public is 5%); E thinks that “They are novel, vivid and energetic, an interesting innovation of linguistic form” (both manufacturers and the public occupy 22%). This shows that the two groups hold consistent opinions toward the objectified new color terms. They believe that these new color terms “come from the free inspiration and innovation of manufacturers, agents, advertisers and salesmen,” “can better reflect consumers’ personality, temperament, identity, favor and living attitude,” “better highlight the quality and design style of products” and serve as “an innovation of linguistic form.”

In terms of the opinion toward the expressive force of new color terms and traditional color words (Question 2), in the four options, A believes that “New color terms fail to express meaning as clearly and directly as traditional color words”(manufacturers are 14 and the public are 17%); B thinks that “New color terms are more popular than traditional color words” (manufacturers hold 45% and the public hold 22%); C considers that“New color terms and traditional color words have different advantages in expression” (manufacturers occupy 32% and the public occupies 51%); D deems that “It’s hard to figure out” (manufacturers are 8% and the public are 10%). It means that as for manufacturers, new color terms should be more popular than traditional color terms among the public; while the public hold a rational opinion and believes that “new color terms and traditional color words have different advantages in expression.”

Similarly, with regard to the social recognition degree of new color terms (Question 3), among four options, A is “Don’t understand; totally no idea” (both manufacturers and the public hold 3%); B is “Obvious coinage, great randomness and arbitrariness, adverse to consumers’ understanding and acceptance as well as wider popularization of terms” (manufacturers are 7% and the public are 8%); C is “Desired unutterable effect; the novel and strange expression makes these color words fashionable, fantastic, poetic and infectious”(manufacturers are 70% and the public are 45%); D is “Some new color terms are difficult to understand but acceptable in general” (manufacturers are 20% and the public are 44%). It means that advertising marketers, manufacturers, agents and product salesmen use the “unutterable effect” of new color terms to attract consumers so as to promote products; while the public believe that new color terms are “fashionable, fantastic, poetic and infectious,” “some new color terms are difficult to understand but acceptable in general.”

With regard to “who created these new color terms and influences the development?” (Question 5 of Group A and Question 4 of Group B), among the four options, A thinks “The public” (manufacturers are 9%, the public is 16%); B believes that “New color terms were created by manufacturers, agents,advertising marketers and salesmen to attract consumers” (manufacturers are 65%, the public is 53%); C believes “Linguistic development rule”(manufacturers are 19% and the public is 21%); D thinks “It’s hard to say” (manufacturers are 7% and the public is 10%). This shows the two groups basically believe new color terms were “created by manufacturers, agents, advertising marketers and salesmen to attract consumers”.

Besides, Group A of Questionnaire 2 makes specific investigation of advertising marketers, manufacturers, agents and salesmen. Question 4 inquires about “the influence of new color terms on consumers in practical selling.”Among the four options, A thinks that “New color terms have influence and can better attract consumers” (39% of the participants); B believes “The terms have great influence. Different color terms may play a decisive role for consumers to select or purchase same type products (for example, under the condition of determining to purchase some product, the comparison of product colors will decide what product to buy”(56% of the participants); C considers“New color terms have small influence with less attention and they make no sense in purchase” (2% of the participants); D is “New color terms almost have no influence and these terms are not essential”(3% of the participants). Question 6 inquires about“Do the products produced, agented, publicized or sold have new color terms and how about the sales volume?” Among the four options, A is “Having new color terms and good sales volume” (72% of the participants); B is “Having new color terms but the sales volume remains to be increased or tends to decrease” (10% of the participants); C is“No new color terms but having no influence on the sales volume” (10% of the participants); D is“No new color terms but the sales volume remains to be increased” (8% of the participants). It means that in practical sales, most advertising marketers, manufacturers, agents and salesmen believe the products with new color terms can “better attract consumers,” “even different color terms play a decisive role for consumers to select or purchase the same type products.” Among the investigated products, most have new color terms and a good sales volume.

Ernst Cassirer (1985) points out that “humans is the animal of symbols” and humans master things by linguistic signs to a large extent. In this sense, new color terms are the new symbol system constructed by humans as the animal of symbols to satisfy self–need and serve as an initiative cognitive activity and creative activity. In this process, colors, as the object, have no emotional elements and feelings result from the introspective package of cognitive subjects. Therefore, decision–makers give full play to the factor of “human participation” in linguistic symbol construction. In reality, some scholars raised the opinion that new color terms “were the second language trap designed by decision–makers” (Ji Yimin, 2006) and believed that manufacturers and advertising marketers, as decision–makers, planned and made some color information codes so as to attract consumers by using a product language montage to create a certain ambiance. Undoubtedly, during the verbal communications of delivering product color information, merchants and consumers constitute the relation between speaker and listener. Therefore, except reflecting merchants’ creative awareness, new color terms should conform to the language appreciation and psychological cognition and play the full function in communicative activity.

The following pattern can explain the interactive relation between the metaphorical expression and psychological cognition of new color terms:

During the verbal communication activity of delivering product color information, merchants (speakers) first hide their cognitive intention in new color terms (procedure ① sending signal) and pass to target consumers (listeners) through metaphorical expression. Once the targeted consumers receive the signal, receiving screen of psychological cognition (procedure ②receiving signal), then consumers make psychological and behavior response (procedure ③ processing signal) through the cognition of received new color terms so as to constantly feed back their information demands to merchants (procedure ④ feeding back information). Finally, merchants cognize consumers’ new psychological demands then act on new color terms (procedure ⑤ regulating information) and realize next round of interactive circulation.

From the dynamic process of verbal communications, the interaction of the relation between metaphorical expression and psychological cognition of new color terms show that; in the coding period, merchants, as speakers, make verbal design of new color terms actively, imagine under what condition and in what forms the metaphorical expression is a valid signal so as to satisfy the targeted consumers. As listeners, consumers also take an active part in verbal communication. After the signal is delivered and received, namely in the decoding period, all the understanding and cognition of consumers will be mobilized to respond to the signal sent by merchants and feed it back to the speakers in some way: that is, the new color terms meeting consumers’ aesthetic psychology, emotional needs are easy to win their preference and attention; while those far–fetched new color terms coined optionally fail to resonate with consumers psychologically or realize the expected communicative effects of merchants. The interaction of the relation between metaphorical expression and psychological cognition of new color terms mainly manifests the convergence of speakers and listeners about the metaphorical expression effect of new color terms, that is only the metaphorical expression recognized by both parties can exert favorable communicative effects. The interactive feature of metaphorical expression determines that the communicative effects must be judged by both parties. Consequently, during the interactive process of metaphorical expression and psychological cognition of new color terms, merchants and consumers are the subjects of verbal communication activities.

3. Further Discussion of the Viability of New Color Terms

At the end of How Much Do You Know About New Color Terms (Questionnaire2), among the four options of “Do you think these new color terms will die out?”A believes that “They will die out. Most terms are far–fetched, showy but not substantial, lack of novelty and do not conform to linguistic development rules and standardization rules” (merchants hold 38% and the public occupy 9%); B thinks that “They will not die out. New color terms have vigorous vitality in expressing the popular tendency of color, reflecting consumers’identity, disposition, life concept, aesthetic demand and pursuit of auspiciousness and prosperity”(merchants hold 38% and the public is 28%); C believes that “They will not die out. New color terms enrich and supplement traditional color terms, avoid linguistic monotony and shortage, increase synonymous expression forms of color, provide new naming ways for color, strengthen the effectiveness of communication and have strong viability”(merchants are 30% and the public is 23%); D thinks “They will not die out. New color terms haveexistent value. But as time goes by, some coinages inconsistent with linguistic norms will be eliminated gradually” (merchants occupy 29% and the public holds 40%). It shows that in general, the two groups believe new color terms have existent value and will not die out in a short time. But as for merchants,“New color terms have vigorous vitality in expressing the popular tendency of color, reflecting consumers’ identity, disposition, life concept, aesthetic demand and pursuit of auspiciousness and prosperity;” while the public holds the reasonable opinion that “New color terms have existent value. But as time goes by, some coinages inconsistent with linguistic norms will be gradually eliminated.”

From the above analysis, according to the development rule and standardization rule of language, we can draw the following preliminary conclusions:

(1)From the necessity of Chinese morpheme renewal, new color terms result from the irreconcilable conflicts between linguistic “empty symbol” and linguistic expression demand. In the fierce market competition environment, when promoting products to the market, manufacturers think about how to seek linguistic ways to make their products more attractive. Since non–innovative traditional color terms cannot satisfy the demands, the contradictions between missing link and expression demand of color terms appear. As a result, new color terms greatly supplement traditional color words.

(2) From the richness of Chinese synonymous form, new color terms avoid the monotony and shortage of language, enrich the synonymous expression form of Chinese color, provide new naming ways for color, reflect aesthetic style of different groups and enhance communicative effectiveness.

(3)From the flexibility of Chinese semantic expression, the information hidden in new color terms far outweigh traditional monosyllable color words. New color terms can realize the optimal communicative effect in limited time and space; the meanings fuzziness does not exceed the public’s acceptable scope or constitute understanding obstacles.

(4)According to Chinese word–formation rules, new color words conform to the modifier–core word–formation pattern of “modifying element + color morpheme” as well as tend to appear pairing and grouping analogy word–formation serialization. A new word can be created as long as a definitive element is embedded before a color morpheme. People are endowed with sufficient freedom to apply the potential “definitive element”to the open structure to form a batch chain reaction. Consequently, the quantity of new color terms tends to increase continuously. It reflects the viability of new color terms in another aspect. Undoubtedly, we should also see that due to random coinage, arbitrary combinations and obscure expressions, the viability and social recognition of new color terms will be tested by time.”

(Translator: Cao Suling; Editor: Xiong Xianwei)

This paper has been translated and reprinted with the permission ofApplied Linguistics, No.1, 2013.

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*Yang Wenquan, professor, School of Literature and Journalism, Sichuan University.

Li Yuanyuan, postgraduate, School of Literature and Journalism, Sichuan University.

*Foundation item: The thesis is financially supported by the National Social Science Fund Project (No. 09BYY053), special project of Sichuan University central university basic scientific research business expense study (No. SKX201025) and Sichuan University Social Science Project in 2008.