SEMANTIC METAMERISM: ETHNO-CULTURAL ASPECT

Abstract

This paper is a contextual study of English black colour term – its etymology, dynamics of the lexical meaning and its ability to reveal controversial components in the corresponding context The analysis is based on the dictionary entries and advertising fragments as actualizers of the referred components. Here contextual is used loosely in the sense that the colour terms are not analysed in isolation but in conjunction with other linguistic units. The overall aim of the study is to describe and analyse a number of aspects of the semantics of English colour terms within the framework of cognitive linguistics. Colour metamerism is the phenomenon wherein two colored samples will appear to be of the same shade under one light source but will appear to be different shades under a second source. In linguistics such colour terms are discussed in the framework of enantiosemia as the intra-word ability to express antonymic relationship. It is also may be interpreted as an intra-word antonymy. The purpose of the article is three-fold: to examine (1) the componential structure of the lexical meaning of the black colour term including its etymology and dynamic semantics; (2) the compositionality of the black with the names of some week days; and (3) the formation of colour metamerisms in English. We put forward a hypothesis according to which the original colour name undergoes dynamic semantic changes and generates controversial components. At present it combines two types of polar components in its lexical meaning, decoding of the respective one by the addressee depends on his/her background knowledge and type of discourse – in our case – economy.