Colourful Language Major Project Proposal

Colourful Language Major Project Proposal

MA Graphic Design Part Time Unit 2.4

Eleanor Maclure

“the names of colours, in themselves, have no precise chromatic content: they must be viewed within the general context of many interacting semiotic systems.�

Batchelor (2000, pp.90)

MA Graphic Design Part Time Unit 2.4 Major Project Proposal

Colourful Language

Eleanor Maclure

Colourful Language Major Project Proposal

“...How it is possible for us accurately to represent colours to each other, when verbal language has proved itself entirely insufficient.�

Batchelor (2000, pp.85)

Major Project Proposal

Introduction

The Optical Society of America suggests that the human eye “can identify between 7.5 and 10 million distinct colours” (Wershler-Henry, 2001). The average adult has a vocabulary of up to 50 000 words (Gall, 2009) and although continuously growing, the estimated number of words in the English language is one to two million (Gall, 2009). If every word in the English language was used, we still would only be able to give names to around one tenth of the colours we can recognize.

This is but one of the problems of using language to describe and define our experience of colour. As discussed by a number of writers and philosophers, David Batchelor in Chromaphobia, in particular, language often proves itself wholly inadequate. There are no standards of individual colour perception as colours vary with context, surface texture and viewing conditions. Colour terms are imprecise and have no chromatic content in themselves and there is no way of knowing that my notion of a particular hue is the same as anyone else’s. Trying to devise a system based on language, to accurately define colours is an impossible task.

Despite this we use language to reference colour all the time, we have too. Often there is no other available means of referring to the particular hue we are trying to describe. Even though the language system we use to talk about colour is inherently flawed, it does not mean that it does not warrant study and analysis to enable greater understanding.

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Research Question

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“To attend to colour, then, is, in part, to attend to the limits of language, what a world without language might be like�

Batchelor (2000, p.79)

Major Project Proposal

Research Question

How We Talk about Colour: Observing the way we use language to describe colours.

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‘To fall into colours is to run out of words’ Batchelor (2000, pp.85)

Major Project Proposal

Aims and Objectives

The fundamental aim of this research project is to contribute to the understanding of how language is used to express colour, through observations, quantitative research, analysis and visual representation.

My initial motivations for choosing this subject were predominantly personal. My interest in how people talk about colour stems from a range of sources; discussions about re-branding at my previous employer, the way colours are described in fashion trend reporting (See Fig. 1 & 2, Appendix B), and the fact that people have endless disagreements over the colour of some objects due to our subjective experiences of colour (Fig. 3 & 4, Appendix B).

The relationship between colour and language and the problems of using language to describe colour are well documented. Colour stretches the limits of our descriptive abilities and consequently our language.

While there is evidently a problem (outlined in greater detail in Context) this project does not propose to solve it. Several thousand years of philosophy have failed to produce an adequate theory or model of colour and some aspects of the problematic relationship of colour to language are beyond the realms of plausible solutions, due to the nature of verbal language itself.

The discourse on colour and language, through philosophy, linguistics and even fine art exists largely as text, resulting in the discussion of a subject, entrenched in our visual culture, using a system of communication widely acknowledged as utterly deficient in describing it.

Therefore, what this project does aim to achieve is a contribution to the understanding of the problem through visual documentation and representation, to use graphic design to show what the relationships between colours and their names look like.

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“what does it mean to divide colour into colours? Where do the divisions occur? Is it possible that these divisions are somehow internal to colour, that they form a part of the nature of colour? Or are they imposed on colour by conventions of language and culture?�

Batchelor (2000, pp.85)

Major Project Proposal

Audience

Colour is a potent tool for designers. We use it to brand, map, chart, code, define and differentiate.

Being able to verbally communicate the colours we perceive and understand how our audience thinks and talks about colour has undeniable value. By seeking to contribute to the understanding of the relationship between colour and language through visual representation, I hope to create greater insight and awareness of how people talk about colour and add to the body of research into design and communication.

The relevance of this research project is not confined to graphic design; it also has meaning for other design and visual communication disciplines including marketing, branding, colour reproduction, trend forecasting and fashion. It could also benefit those who use colour as an aspect of communication and who need to be able to communicate about colour, such as in architecture, interior and product design.

Ultimately, we live in a visually stimulating world, and due to advances in technology, one particularly saturated in colour. Apart from the visually impaired, colour touches us all. We all see it, whether or not we truly notice it, we all use language to describe it, whether in great detail or with just a few basic terms and quite a few of us argue over it. So although this project is not primarily aimed at the wider population, from research conducted thus far, it is evident

that there is a significant interest in colour and its relationship to culture among the visually literate public, particularly prevalent in blogging (See Fig. 3 & 4, Appendix B), creating the potential for broader appeal.

In addition, to this I would like to contribute to the field of study and existing body of research and knowledge on colour naming. In that respect I hope to find an audience in those who also are studying colour naming, or who have an interest in linguistics, semiotics, colour theory, culture, the visual arts, perception, philosophy or the general advancement of knowledge, learning and understanding.

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‘Basic colour terms may be universal, but they are useless when it comes to the study of colour.’ Batchelor (2000, pp.92)

Major Project Proposal

Context

The subject of this research project lies where two different fields of study coincide: colour theory and linguistics. Both these areas of research have a long history and include many concepts and theories.

Colour theory alone bridges a wide range of disciplines from; physics and optics, to the visual arts, to biology and neuroscience. To further define the project I will be narrowing my research to the general areas of colour perception, semiotics and naming, with the particular focus of my proposal being the names of colours, as indicated by the Research Question.

Both fields of study already have well-established bodies of knowledge and research. General research into colour will provide background information for my investigation, as will research into how we see colour and colour reproduction. Issues in these areas will influence my visual research and methods of collecting quantitative data so need to be acknowledged.

Linguistics is also a substantial field of study. To contain the scope of the background research I will only include linguistic concepts, such as semiotics when relevant to the research question. The Proposed Reading List, at the end of this document, will help me to identify other linguistic theories, which may support my investigation.

There has been much written about colour in philosophy, notably by Pythagoras (570-c. 495 BC) on colour harmony, Plato (427 - 347 BC) on colour perception, and Aristotle (384-322 BC) on colour mixing. Other theories of colour were later developed, through painting by Leonardo da Vinci (Treatise on

Painting) and scientific methods, by Sir Isaac Newton in 1666. More recent philosophical works have included writing on the complex relationship between colour and language, in particular Goethe’s Theory of Colours (1810), Wittgenstein’s Remarks on Colour (1977) and Hardin’s Colour for Philosophers (1988).

There also exists a sizeable body of research specifically on colour naming. A significant amount has been carried out by Paul Kay (co-author of the Berlin-Kay hypothesis) with others, since the late 1960s, including the World Colour Survey. There are also currently a number of online colour naming projects including colour naming experiments by Nathan Moroney, for Hewlett-Packard, cumulating in The Colour Thesaurus (see Fig. 5 & 6, Appendix B) and An Online Colour Naming Model by LCC MSc. Digital Colour Imaging student Dimitris Mylonas.

Much of this research has a significant cross-cultural component and although colour naming across different language systems is a rich area of study, it is a whole subject in itself and too extensive to include in any detail as it raises problems of translation and cultural sensitivity. Therefore I intend to confine my research to colour naming in the English language, and only refer to cultural differences when particularly significant.

The current research in the areas of colour naming and colour perception revolves around a number of debates, including, in colour naming: Linguistic Relativity versus Universalism. Does language condition how we see colour or is it a purely biological

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‘Wittgenstein asked: ‘How do I know this colour is red?’ To which he replied: ‘… because I have learned English.’

Batchelor (2000, p.91)

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mechanism? In colour perception: Objectivism versus Subjectivism. Is colour subjective or objective? Does it appear in the perceived object or in the subject’s eye?

These debates, and others, are very much unresolved and are unlikely to be settled without a great deal more research, if at all. This is one of the reasons that I have specified from the outset of this proposal that this project is not an attempt to solve the problems involved in using language to describe colour. From the research already undertaken I have been able to identify some of the key aspects of this problem, which will facilitate my visual investigations into the subject: 1. The names of colour have no chromatic content so there is no consensus on what exact hue a particular name refers to. If an author writes the word ‘blue’ in a text, they will never know if the reader fully understood what hue they meant by that colour term.

2. Language is inadequate in describing the range of colours we are able to optically identify because there simply aren’t enough words in the English language.

3. We lack the ability to use language to identify the vast range of hues in the world around us precisely and often resort to pointing to a similar colour or improvising using descriptions of other objects such as “milky tea coloured” 4. The way we see colour is subjective but we cannot convey that with language. We all see slightly differently but we must use the same words to communicate that experience otherwise we cannot be understood.

5. Although language is limited in describing colour there are still several thousand colour names, yet we predominantly use a small collection of basic terms to describe a vast range of experiences. In English there are eleven basic colour terms.

6. There is often a lack of understanding of what hue less common colour names refer to, for example puce, taupe and mauve.

7. By using language to define and describe colours we attach a whole host of connotations and cultural meanings to a hue, so it is incredibly difficult to talk about a colour objectively as pure chroma, detached from meaning.

8. There is no way of explaining colours or a particular colour to someone who has never seen it.

Some of the problems listed above have already been addressed in some way, either through philosophical writing such as those by Wittgenstein and Hardin or the development of an alternative system to language.

The imprecision of colour terms has been tackled

by Albert Munsell creator of the Munsell Colour System, who described colour names as ‘’foolish and misleading” (1905, pp.9) and the Pantone Matching System, both of which employ numeric methods to define colours. However, these systems are only applicable in certain contexts and are impractical for everyday conversation. They fail to capture the extent to which we experience colour.

Although the focus of my research is not directly related to graphic design itself, both colour and language are key aspects of graphic design and vital tools for a graphic designer. They are entrenched in our design practice and hugely influential on our

Major Project Proposal

communications. The difficulty with colour naming is, ultimately, a communication problem, albeit a potentially unsolvable one.

A small minority of colour naming experiments have a visual component as part of their output. The visual outcome of research by Nathan Moroney, the Colour Thesaurus (Fig. 5 & 6, Appendix B), is one example of this, however it is limited in its use of graphic design and data visualisation methods. From my research only a project by Crowd Flower (formally Dolres Labs), which resulted in an interactive colour label explorer, utilises information design techniques in a way that enhances the understanding of the data. This was particularly evident in the visualisations posted on their blog (http://blog.crowdflower.com) after the data was released into the online community; see Fig. 7 & 8, Appendix B. As described in Aims and Objectives, a disproportionate amount of the research that exists on colour naming is written discourse not visual representation. Therefore, the relationship of this project to graphic design is in the usage of design methods to visually represent research in an area where two fields closely related to graphic design coincide.

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Action Plan

Structure of The Major Project Title

Colourful Language

Field of Study

Colour Theory

Linguistics

+

Colour Perception + Naming 16 Focus

Colour Naming

Research Question

Graphic Design Fine Art Philosophy Semiotics Communications Marketing Psychology Neuroscience Biology Optics Physics

Methodology

How We Talk about Colour Observing the way we use language to describe colours

Audience

Context

Aims & Objectives

Formal & Informal Colour Naming

Commercial Colour Naming

Unit 2.3 Design & Rhetoric Primary Research

+

Secondary Research

Quantitative

Visual

Further Reading

Evaluation Output

Print

Typographic Book

Submission

Information Design

Research Blog + Visual Summary + Major Project Report + Outputs

Bibliography

Major Project Proposal

Action Plan

The research methodology for this project will largely be based on using carefully constructed surveys to collect primary data. These will then be collated and analysed, before being visually interpreted using information design and data visualisation techniques.

These techniques will also be researched, through secondary sources, as will suitable quantitative data collection and best practices for surveying The other key components of my research plan are to collate and typologies the research I have already collected from a variety of sources thus far, and to complete the relevant background reading that I have identified.

The Schedule of Works on the following pages shows an approximate representation of the timings and duration of each planned research activity and a more detailed and comprehensive description of the Action Plan can be found in Appendix A.

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Schedule of Work The schedule below indicates the order and timings of activities as described in the detailed Action Plan (Appendix A, week by week). It may transpire, as the project develops, that additional research is required in a particular area or that planned research is no longer relevant. However the stages of the project should largely stay constant and the progress of each research activity will be checked against the Schedule throughout the project.

Unit 2 Submission 18

Week Number

1

2

Jan 31st Background Reading Collection of Colour Names Typologising Colour Names Devising Surveys Administering Surveys Collating Survey Results Analysis of Survey Results Visual Representation of Survey Results Visit SDC Colour Experience in Bradford Visit British Library Other Primary Research Activities Other Secondary Research Activities Documentation of Research on Blog Documentation of Research in Visual Summary Research for Report Production of Outcomes Collation of Research for MP Report Report Writing Printing and Preparation for Submission

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4

5

6

Feb 7th

14th

21st

7

8

9

21st

28th

Mar 28th

7th

14th

Major Project Proposal

Progress Crit 10

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12

13

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15

April 4th

11th

18th

16

17

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19

May 25th

2nd

9th

16th

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22

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June 23rd

30th

6th

13th

20th

24 July

27th

4th

11th

19

Schedule of Work Continued

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Week Commencing

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26

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July 18th Background Reading Collection of Colour Names Typologising Colour Names Devising Surveys Administering Surveys Collating Survey Results Analysis of Survey Results Visual Representation of Survey Results Visit SDC Colour Experience in Bradford Visit British Library Other Primary Research Activities Other Secondary Research Activities Documentation of Research on Blog Documentation of Research in Visual Summary Research for Report Production of Outcomes Collation of Research for MP Report Report Writing Printing and Preparation for Submission

25th

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30

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Aug 1st

8th

15th

33 Sep

22nd

29th

5th

12th

Major Project Proposal

Progress Crit 34

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Report First Draft 37

Sep 19th

26th

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Final Submission 40

Oct 3rd

10th

17th

41 Nov

24th

31st

7th

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“If colour is indivisible, a continuum, what sense can there be in talking of colours? None, obviously… except we do it all the time” Batchelor (2000, pp. 85)

Major Project Proposal

Evaluation

I intend to employ critical reflection as the primary method of evaluation for the project. Given that the project is research through design into a subject related to it, rather than into a practical design problem, this is the most appropriate form of evaluation. This will also be supported by feedback from peers and tutors, which could be facilitated through my research blog. The blog will be made public, which may also invite engagement from the wider research community, creating the potential for diverse sources of feedback. I also intend to compare aspects of my research with other similar research projects, such as the Online Colour Naming experiment as part of the basis for my critical reflection.

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“Such basic colour terms as we have, to put it another way, even terms like ‘colour’, are the products of language and culture more than the products of colour.”

Batchelor (2000, pp.89)

Major Project Proposal

Output

While some aspects of this project may lend themselves quite well to a multimedia, motion graphics or online output, I do not possess the technical proficiency necessary to execute screenbased outcomes competently. As a consequence I am specifying a print based outcome from the start, as attempting to learn additional technical skills and software would be too greater burden to the project and would compromise the time, resources and effort needed for the execution of the project as a whole.

Producing a print based output will still provide me with some opportunity for acquiring technical knowledge as a by-product of production. Despite having a good understanding of the print process there is still much I can learn about design for print, of which colour perception and accurate colour reproduction play a significant part.

Given the research question I have outlined and context provided, I envisage breaking down the project into a series of sub-projects to address different aspects of the relationship between colour and language. Each of these could potentially have some sort of visual outcome, the combination of which would represent the collective output of the project. In this instance the body of work would be united through the research presented in the major project report and visual summary.

Alternatively, one aspect of the project may become more dominant. Therefore I have not dismissed the option of producing one outcome to represent the culmination of all the research for the project, which would likely take the form of a book, for example a dictionary of colour.

I anticipate any outcomes produced for this project are likely, at least in some part, to be typographic and/or include information design in order to present research findings, analysis and conclusions, particularly of the quantitative research outlined in the action plan. See Fig. 9, 10 & 11, Appendix B for visual references.

In addition, all potential outcomes will be supported by an edited visual summary and a research blog.

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Appendices

Appendix A Detailed Action Plan 28

I have already completed a significant amount of background reading for the Major Project in the course of preparing this proposal and for Unit 2.3 Design and Rhetoric. In addition, I have been able to identify a comprehensive list of key texts as proposed further reading, which will greatly support my understanding of the relationship between language and colour. It is possible that not all of the texts will be read in full, due to the time constraints of the project.

Texts most relevant to the research will be given priority. For the list of texts, please see Proposed Reading List.

I have identified other areas of background research needed to support the project. These include gaining a better understanding of colour perception in humans and general colour theory, reading into semiotics, research into information design, data visualization and good practices for quantitative data collection. Additional sources of research will include visiting The Society of Dyers and Colourists (SDC) Colour Experience museum in Bradford and attending any relevant talks, lectures and exhibitions in London, beginning with Evolving English at the British Library in February. Other further reading and internet research is included in the Proposed Reading List.

I have already gathered a significant body of secondary sources to support my growing knowledge of colour and language, as mentioned above. Some of this material will be used to compile an extensive list of colour names. I will exclude names from commercial sources, for example the names

of paint colours. Following this I will typologise them into the eleven basic colour terms used in English, and look at which hues are difficult to categorise. I will consider why they do not fit and look for patterns and similarities. I will also look at which hues have the most and least associated colour terms, whether the terms are abstract or descriptive and what this typology means and how it appears visually. This will help support my primary research and visual work and provide a basis for comparison of survey results To address the Research Question and problems outlined in Context, I intend to conduct a series of carefully devised surveys. I anticipated that this research will be predominantly quantitative, with the surveys designed to be straightforward and simple to encourage participation, possibly built in Survey Monkey or a similar alternative. They will mostly likely be administered online (through Facebook, email, and blog sites), if the problems of viewing colours on screen can be resolved satisfactorily or a level of tolerance accounted for within the results. This research is likely to form a significant part of the primary data I collect.

These surveys will include looking at the extent of colour vocabulary, in which I will ask people to list as many colour terms as they can think of and then list as many informal, descriptive ways of referring to colour as they can, for example ‘ice-cream coloured’.

Concurrently I will collect demographic data on age, gender, whether English is their first language (if not what language is), what their favourite colour is, how much time they spent on the task (in minutes)

Major Project Proposal

and whether they work or have studied in the visual arts, to enable me to make comparisons based on age, gender (as women are, on average better at both language skills, and perceiving colour), visual communicator versus non-visual communicator (do designers have bigger colour vocabularies?) and native speaker versus non-native speaker.

I will also collate the most frequently listed colours from the results, to see how they relate to the basic colour terms in English and look at which are abstract and which are descriptive colours.

Another survey will ask people to describe the hue of some uncommon colour terms. For example what colour puce? This could be done through relating it to a combination of basic colour terms, for example “purpley-red�. If possible it would be preferable to construct a survey where this could be done visually, through digital colour picking so that RGB values could be obtained. In opposition to this I will also present people with ambiguous swatches and ask them to name the colour. The responses can then be compared to see how much consensus there is and how precise people are able to be.

How do we know what is red? Using a series of colour swatches of similar hues I will ask what people identify as the most archetypal example of that colour, to see if there is a consensus for the chromatic meaning of colour terms, for all of the eleven basic colour terms in English. I will be able to compare these with the RGB values for the swatches and possibly create averages based on the results.

To look at the idea of subjectivity in colour naming and perception I intend to research how people argue about colour. For example, when one person maintains a jacket is yellow and the other person insists that it is green. What colours do people argue about? Are there patterns and commonalities? How does this relate to the boundaries between colours and the linguistic categories we put them in?

In addition to this primary research I will investigate the linguistics origins of some colour names, most likely through online sources. This research is already underway, although I have yet to establish how far I will extend this task. I will also research the cultural meanings of different colours in Western culture, focussing on the eleven basic colour terms, in order to investigate the connotations of different colour names.

I will also collect linguistic phrases, clichĂŠs and metaphors that employ a colour term to communicate a visual idea through verbal language, for example green with envy, white goods, purple with rage, in order to look at how people evoke colour in language to create meaning, emphasis and convey mental pictures.

Further to this I want to look at what colour we label our mental images, are roses red for all of us, do we always picture grass as green? If so does this come from cultural conditioning, mental schemas or the local colours of objects, even if that reality is rarely true? To investigate this I will use a survey to ask people what colour they would label common objects

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(such as an apple, duck, the sea) as a instinctive reaction. I will use the results to ascertain if there are commonalities in people’s responses.

I also hope to generate visual research and supporting material as part of the project using photography and photo-manipulation techniques and look at data visualisation techniques and information design to successfully visualize the results of my survey.

The data collected will ultimately be represented visually using graphic design, with references for this aspect of the project being the Colour Naming Thesaurus (Fig. 5 & 6, Appendix B), the research and colour label explorer by CrowdFlower (Fig. 7 & 8, Appendix B), other examples of information design, for example those shown in Figs. 9, 10 & 11 in Appendix B and the websites www.emotionallyvague. com, www.wefeelfine.org and www.visualcomplexity. com. A project by Professor Axel Venn and Janina Venn-Rosky, recently published in the form of the book The Colour Dictionary will also be a useful to reference, despite the focus of their research being slightly different, see Fig. 12 & 13, Appendix B. Alongside the specific research activities outlined above, throughout the course of the Major Project I will be recording my research in my supporting material, visual summary and on my research blog. I will also be collating research to include in the Major Project report and allocating time towards the end of the project for writing the report and producing outcomes, as outlined in the Schedule of Work.

Major Project Proposal

Appendix B List of Figures Fig. 1 Article about the colour of Michelle Obama’s Dress.

SMITH, H., 2010. Race row over ‘nude’ White House Dress. The Metro, 21 May. pp.32.

Fig. 2 Comment on Neutral Colour Trends in 2010.

BLISSETT, B. 2010. Greige is the new nude, girls. The Metro, page & date unknown.

Fig. 3 Blog post about an argument over the colour of a car.

Sheri, 2010. Colour: Is it a cultural thing? Things and Stuff Blog [blog] 22 October Available at: <http://aaronandsheri. wordpress.com/2010/10/22/colour-is-it-a-cultural-thing/> [Accessed 22/10/10].

Fig. 4 Image of the car described in the above post.

Sheri, 2010. Colour: Is it a cultural thing? Things and Stuff Blog [blog] 22 October Available at: <http://aaronandsheri. wordpress.com/2010/10/22/colour-is-it-a-cultural-thing/> [Accessed 22/10/10].

Fig. 5 Cover of the Colour Thesaurus by Nathan Moroney.

MORONEY, N., 2008. The colour thesaurus. June ed. Hewlett-Packard Laboratories: Magcloud.com.

Fig. 6 Example of a typical page from the Colour Thesaurus.

MORONEY, N., 2008. The colour thesaurus. June ed. pp.10. Hewlett-Packard Laboratories: Magcloud.com.

Fig. 7 Colour Label Explorer by CrowdFlower.

O’CONNER, B., 2008. Where does “Blue” end and “Red” begin? The CrowdFlower Blog [blog] 17 March, Available at: <http://blog.crowdflower.com/2008/03/where-does-blue-end-and-red-begin/> [Accessed 19/12/10].

Fig. 8 Visualisation by Martin Wattenberg from IBM Research of data released by CrowdFlower.

CLARKE, J., 2008. Colour Names Explorer. Neoformix Blog [blog] 27 March, Available at: <http://www.neoformix.com/2008/ ColorNamesExplorer.html> [Accessed 19/12/10].

Fig. 9 The ‘In’ Colours in Women’s fashion.

MCCANDLESS. D., 2010. Information is beautiful. London : Collins, pp.32-33.

Fig. 10 The meanings of colours in different cultures around the world.

MCCANDLESS. D., 2010. Information is beautiful. London : Collins, pp.76.

Fig. 11 Food colourings linked to adverse health effects.

MCCANDLESS. D., 2010. Information is beautiful. London : Collins, pp.119.

Fig. 12 Cover of The Colour Dictionary.

VENN, A., & VENN-ROSKY, J., 2010. The colour dictionary, the colourfulness of the words. Munich : Callwey Verlag.

Fig. 13 Example spread from The Colour Dictionary.

VENN, A., & VENN-ROSKY, J., 2010. The colour dictionary, the colourfulness of the words. Munich : Callwey Verlag, page unknown.

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Appendix B Visual References 32

Fig. 1 Article about the colour of Michelle Obama’s Dress.

SMITH, H., 2010. Race row over ‘nude’ White House Dress. The Metro, 21 May. pp.32.

Fig. 2 Comment on Neutral Colour Trends in 2010.

BLISSETT, B. 2010. Greige is the new nude, girls. The Metro, page & date unknown.

Major Project Proposal

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Fig. 3 Blog post about an argument over the colour of a car.

Sheri, 2010. Colour: Is it a cultural thing? Things and Stuff Blog [blog] 22 October Available at: <http:// aaronandsheri.wordpress.com/2010/10/22/colour-is-it-a-cultural-thing/> [Accessed 22/10/10].

Fig. 4 Image of the car described in the above post.

Sheri, 2010. Colour: Is it a cultural thing? Things and Stuff Blog [blog] 22 October Available at: <http:// aaronandsheri.wordpress.com/2010/10/22/colour-is-it-a-cultural-thing/> [Accessed 22/10/10].

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Fig. 5 Cover of the Colour Thesaurus by Nathan Moroney.

MORONEY, N., 2008. The colour thesaurus. June ed. Hewlett-Packard Laboratories: Magcloud.com.

Fig. 6 Example of a typical page from the Colour Thesaurus.

MORONEY, N., 2008. The colour thesaurus. June ed. pp.10. Hewlett-Packard Laboratories: Magcloud.com.

Major Project Proposal

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Fig. 7 Colour Label Explorer by CrowdFlower.

O’CONNER, B., 2008. Where does “Blue” end and “Red” begin? The CrowdFlower Blog [blog] 17 March, Available at: <http://blog.crowdflower.com/2008/03/where-does-blue-end-and-red-begin/> [Accessed 19/12/10].

Fig. 8 Visualisation by Martin Wattenberg from IBM Research of data released by CrowdFlower.

CLARKE, J., 2008. Colour Names Explorer. Neoformix Blog [blog] 27 March, Available at: <http://www. neoformix.com/2008/ColorNamesExplorer.html> [Accessed 19/12/10].

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Fig. 9, Fig. 10 & Fig. 11 Examples ways of visualising colour-related data.

MCCANDLESS. D., 2010. Information is beautiful. London : Collins. pp.32-33, 76 and 119, respectively

Major Project Proposal

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Fig. 12 Cover of The Colour Dictionary.

VENN, A., & VENN-ROSKY, J., 2010. The colour dictionary, the colourfulness of the words. Munich : Callwey Verlag.

Fig. 13 Example Spread from The Colour Dictionary.

VENN, A., & VENN-ROSKY, J., 2010. The colour dictionary, the colourfulness of the words. Munich : Callwey Verlag, page unknown.

References

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BATCHELOR, D., 2000. Chromaphobia. London: Reaktion.

GALL, C., 2009. The words in the mental cupboard. BBC News Magazine. [online] Available at: <http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/ magazine/8013859.stm> [Accessed 19/12/10].

MUNSELL, A. H., 1905. A Color Notation. Boston: G. H. Ellis Co. WERSHLER-HENRY, D., 2001. Colours/Ruby (and beyond). Cabinet Magazine, Issue 4, pp.16-18.

Major Project Proposal

Bibliography

About.com Desktop Publishing, 2010. Atomic Age Colour Combinations. [online] Available at: <http://desktoppub.about. com/od/colorpalettes/l/blcpatomicage.htm> [Accessed 12/10/10].

ALLEN, C. P., 2010. Paint names that speak to the soul, Greenville (S.C.) News, [online] Available at: <http://www.azcentral. com/style/hfe/decor/articles/2010/03/18/20100318paint-names-make-a-difference.html> [Accessed 20/08/10].

AMBROSE, G., & HARRIS, P., 2005. Colour. Lausanne: AVA. ANON., 2002. Colour: the silent language, PCI Magazine, [online] Available at: <http://www.pcimag.com/Articles/Feature_Art icle/2cabedee696a7010VgnVCM100000f932a8c0____> [Accessed 20/11/10].

ANON., 2010a. Change as a constant. Novum, Issue 12/10, pp.46-47.

ANON., 2010b. Bright and beautiful. Novum, Issue 12/10, pp.50-51.

ANON., 2010c. Subtlest Nuances. Novum, Issue 12/10, pp.52-53.

ARMSTRONG, L., 2007. Hereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s looking at hue. Exhibitor Magazine, [online] Available at: <http://www.exhibitoronline.com/ exhibitormagazine/sept07/exhibitdesign0907.asp> [Accessed 20/11/10].

BERETTA, G., 2010. The colour of water. Mostly Colour Channel, [blog] 15 October, Available at: <http://www.mostlycolor. ch/search/label/color%20names> [Accessed 17/10/10].

BERGER, R., 2009. 100 colours, 100 writings, 100 days. Design Observer, [blog] 10 July, Available at: <http://observatory. designobserver.com/entry.html?entry=11257> [Accessed 06/08/10].

BLISSETT, B. 2010. Greige is the new nude, girls. The Metro, p. & date unknown.

BRADLEY, D., 2007. How colourful language can improve your image. Science Base, [blog] 30 April Available at: <http:// www.sciencebase.com/science-blog/use-colourful-language-to-improve-your-image.html> [Accessed 11/10/10].

Causes of Colour. 2010. Colour Theory. [online] Available at: <http://www.webexhibits.org/causesofcolor/1B.html> [Accessed 25/11/10].

CLARKE, J., 2008. Colour Names Explorer. Neoformix, [blog] 27 March, Available at: <http://www.neoformix.com/2008/ ColorNamesExplorer.html> [Accessed 19/12/10].

ColourBrewer, 2010. [online] Available at: <http://www.personal.psu.edu/cab38/ColorBrewer/ColorBrewer.html> [Accessed 27/09/10].

Coloria, 2010. Colourature. [online] Available at: <http://coloria.net/bonus/colornames.htm> [Accessed 11/10/10].

Colournames, 2010. [online] Available at: <http://www.freimann.eu/domains/colornames.ch/> [Accessed 29/09/10].

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Colour Name Dictionaries, 2010. [online] Available at: <http://people.csail.mit.edu/jaffer/Color/Dictionaries> [Accessed 27/09/10].

Colour Naming Experiment, 2009. [online] Available at: <http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Nathan_Moroney/color-name-hpl. html> [Accessed 30/09/10].

CONLEY, C., 2007. Unusual Colour Wheels found in Life and Art. Colourlovers blog, [blog] 11 December. Available at: <http://www.colourlovers.com/blog/2007/12/11/unusual-color-wheels-found-in-life-and-art/> [Accessed 29/09/10].

CULLEN, C. D., 2001. Then is now: sampling from the past for today’s graphics. Gloucester Massachusetts: Rockport Publishers.

DAVEY, M., 2008. Colours/Maroon. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 30, pp.17-19.

DOLVEN, J., 2009. Colours/Verdigris. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 35, pp.16-17.

ECO, U., 1985. How culture conditions the colours we see. In: BLONSKY, M., ed. 1985. On signs. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, pp.157-175.

Efg’s Computer Lab Reference Library. 2009. Colour. [online] Available at: <http://www.efg2.com/Lab/Library/Color/index. html> [Accessed 22/09/10].

Encyclopedia of Irish and World Art, 2010. Artists Colour Pigments. [online] Available at: <http://www.visual-arts-cork.com/ artist-paints/colour-pigments.htm> [Accessed 19/09/10].

E-paint.co.uk, 2010. BS 381C Colour Chart. [online] Available at: <http://www.e-paint.co.uk/BS381%20Colourchart.asp> [Accessed 23/09/10].

500+ Colours, 2010. [online] Available at: <http://cloford.com/resources/colours/500col.htm> [Accessed 23/09/10].

FLÜCK, D., 2008. Colour name & hue. Colblindor blog, [blog] 9 January, Available at: <http://www.colblindor.com/colorname-hue/> [Accessed 11/10/10].

GILBERT, A., 2007. Colours/Brown. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 25, pp.10-12.

Global Colour Research, 2010. [online] Available at: <http://www.globalcolor.co.uk/color_trends.php> [Accessed 29/09/10].

GOUDARZI, S., 2005. First Picture of Living Human Retina Reveals Surprise. Live Science blog, [blog] 28 November Available at: <http://www.livescience.com/health/051128_eye_image.html> [Accessed 11/10/10].

GRIGELY, J., 2007. Colours/White. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 27, pp.14-16.

HANDLER, D., 2006. Colours/Violet. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 24, pp.12-14.

Major Project Proposal

HANSEN, C., 2009. Colours/Porphyry. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 33, pp.13-15.

HARA, K., 2007. White. Baden: Lars Muller Publishers.

HARRIS, D., 2002. Paint and paint names. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 7, pp.40-43 HOFFMAN, D., 2001. The data problem for colour objectivism. [online] Available at: <www.cogsci.uci.edu/~ddhoff/2001-53ColorObjectivism.pdf> [Accessed 24/08/10].

Horizon Episode 4. Is Seeing Believing?, 2010 [Television Programme], BBC, BBC 2, 18 October 21.00.

HORYN, C., 2007. Pantone’s colour of the year is…, New York Times, [online] Available at: <http://www.nytimes. com/2007/12/20/fashion/20COLOR.html?pagewanted=2> [Accessed 13/11/10].

How many colours can you name in five minutes, 2008. [online] Available at: <http://www.oneplusyou.com/bb/view2/colors> [Accessed 23/09/10].

Importance of Philosophy, 2010. A is A: Aristotle’s Law of Identity. [online] Available at: <http://www.importanceofphilosophy. com/Metaphysics_Identity.html> [Accessed 19/09/10].

JACKSON, S., 2007. Colours/Mauve. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 28, pp.7-9.

JAITNER, P., 2010. Eternal Youth. Novum, Issue 12/10, pp.42-43.

JAITNER, P., 2010. Colour follows function. Novum, Issue 12/10, pp.48-49.

KAY, P., 2009. Colour vocabulary and pre-attentive colour perception. Language Log blog, [blog] 23 February, Available at: <http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1172> [Accessed 25/08/10].

LA FARGE, P., 2008. Colours/Black. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 36, pp.10-12.

Language in Use, 2010. Colour names – Background and connotations. [online] Available at: <http://www.putlearningfirst. com/language/19advert/colournames1.html> [Accessed 31/10/10].

Language in Use, 2010. Colour names and Connotations. [online] Available at: <http://www.putlearningfirst.com/ language/19advert/colour_names2.html> [Accessed 31/10/10].

Language in Use, 2010. Counting Eskimo words for snow. [online] Available at: <http://www.putlearningfirst.com/language/ research/eskimo.html> [Accessed 31/10/10].

Language in Use, 2010. Research on Colour Words. [online] Available at: <http://www.putlearningfirst.com/language/ research/colour_words.html> [Accessed 31/10/10].

LOVECHILD, D., 2007. Colours/Olive. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 25, pp.16-19.

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MALISZEWSKI, P., 2010. Colours/Green. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 37, pp.12-15.

Mind Papers, 2010. Physicalist Theories of Colour. [online] Available at: <http://consc.net/mindpapers/3.7a> [Accessed 25/08/10].

MIZRAHI, V., 2006. Color objectivism and color pluralism. [online] Available at: <www.mizrahi.ch/philo/Mizrahi_Pluralism. pdf> [Accessed 20/08/10].

MOOSMANN, C., 2010. Adieu tristesse. Novum, Issue 12/10, pp.44-45.

MORONEY, N., 2007. An online colour thesaurus. Mostly Colour Channel, [blog] 29 October, Available at: < http://www. edwardtufte.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=0000XT> [Accessed 17/10/10].

MORONEY, N., 2008. The colour thesaurus. June ed. Hewlett-Packard Laboratories: Magcloud.com.

Mostly Colour Channel, 2010. [blog] Available at: <http://www.mostlycolor.ch/> [Accessed 17/09/10].

MUSSARI, M., 2002. Umberto Eco would have made a bad fauve. Media & Culture Journal, [online] Available at: <http:// journal.media-culture.org.au/0207/eco.php> [Accessed 20/08/10].

Names of Colours, 2010. [online] Available at: <http://www.yaelf.com/colour.shtml> [Accessed 20/09/10].

Name that Colour, 2010. [online] Available at: <http://chir.ag/projects/name-that-color/> [Accessed 11/10/10].

NELSON, M., 2010. Colours/Red. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 38, pp.7-9.

NIELSEN HAYDEN, T., 2004. Prophetable colours. Making Light blog, [blog] 14 July, Available at: <http://nielsenhayden.com/ makinglight/archives/005397.html> [Accessed 20/11/10].

O’CONNER, B., 2008. Where does “Blue” end and “Red” begin?, The CrowdFlower Blog, [blog] 17 March, Available at: <http://blog.crowdflower.com/2008/03/where-does-blue-end-and-red-begin/> [Accessed 19/12/10].

Optical Society of America, 2010. [online] Available at: <http://www.osa.org/> [Accessed 21/11/10].

O’ REILLY, S., 2009. Colours/Magenta. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 34, pp.17-19.

Pantone, 1999. Pantone Pronounces this Sky Blue as the Hue of the Future. [press release], 26 April 1999, Available at: <http://www.pantone.com/pages/pantone/pantone.aspx?pg=20194&ca=10> [Accessed 13/11/10].

Pantone, 2003. 40 years of colour: Pantone looks back at four decades of colour and culture on the occasion of its 40th anniversary. [online], Available at: <http://www.pantone.co.uk/pages/pantone/Pantone.aspx?pg=19758&ca=26> [Accessed 13/11/10].

Major Project Proposal

Pantone, 2007a. Pantone Selects Colour of the Year for 2007: PANTONE® 19-1557 CHILI PEPPER. [press release], 16 January 2007, Available at: <http://www.pantone.com/pages/pantone/pantone.aspx?pg=20365&ca=10> [Accessed 13/11/10].

Pantone, 2007b. Pantone Selects Colour of the Year for 2008: PANTONE® 18-3943 BLUE IRIS. [press release], 10 December 2007, Available at: <http://www.pantone.com/pages/pantone/pantone.aspx?pg=20540&ca=10> [Accessed 13/11/10].

Pantone, 2008. Pantone Selects Colour of the Year for 2009: Pantone 14-0848 MIMOSA. [press release], 3 December 2008, Available at: <http://www.pantone.com/pages/pantone/pantone.aspx?pg=20634&ca=10> [Accessed 13/11/10].

Pantone, 2009a. Pantone Unveils Colour of the Year for 2010: Pantone 15-5519 Turquoise. [press release], 8 December 2008, Available at: <http://www.pantone.com/pages/pantone/pantone.aspx?pg=20706&ca=10> [Accessed 13/11/10].

Pantone, 2010. Pantone Reveals Color of the Year for 2011: PANTONE 18-2120 Honeysuckle. [press release], Available at: <http://www.pantone.com/pages/pantone/Pantone.aspx?ca=4&pg=20821> [Accessed 19/12/10].

Pantone Colour Names, 2010. [online] Available at: <http://www.dspgroup.co.uk/material/ColourNamesPanton.htm> [Accessed 20/11/10].

Paul Kay’s Homepage, 2007. [online] Available at: <http://www.icsi.berkeley.edu/~kay/> [Accessed 22/09/10].

PENDLE, G., 2008. Colours/Prussian Blue. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 31, pp.14-16.

Practise, 2010. Recent Projects. [online] Available at: <http://www.practise.co.uk/work/archive/spring-snow.html> [Accessed 25/08/10].

QUINION, M., 1996. The fugitive names of hues. [online] Available at: <http://www.worldwidewords.org/articles/colour.htm> [Accessed 20/09/10].

RICH, E., 1977. Sex-related differences in colour vocabulary. [online] Available at: <http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/ear/SexRelated_Colour.htm> [Accessed 24/08/10].

RILEY, C. A., 1995. Colour Codes: modern theories of colour in philosophy, painting and architecture, literature, music and psychology. London; Hanover: University Press of New England.

ROYSDON, E., 2008. Colours/Opal. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 29, pp.18-19.

SANDERS, B., 2008. Colours/Puce. Cabinet Magazine, Issue 32, pp.16-18.

SCHULZ, B., 2010. A special kind of dictionary of colours. Novum, Issue 12/10, pp.38-41.

Sheri, 2010. Colour: Is it a cultural thing?. Things and Stuff blog, [blog] 22 October Available at: <http://aaronandsheri. wordpress.com/2010/10/22/colour-is-it-a-cultural-thing/> [Accessed 22/10/10].

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SMITH, H., 2010. Race row over ‘nude’ White House Dress. The Metro, 21 May. pp.32.

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2006. Colour. [online] Available at: <http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/color/> [Accessed 25/08/10].

STEWART, J., 2010. The Wonderful Colour Wheel. Imprint blog, [blog] 15 July Available at: <http://imprint.printmag.com/ color/the-wondrous-color-wheel-part-1/> [Accessed 29/09/10].

STYLE, C., 2010a. Jennifer Young’s Friday color series. Trendland blog, [blog] 11 August, Available at: <http://trendland. net/2010/08/11/jennifer-young-firdays-color-series/> [Accessed 12/11/10].

STYLE, C., 2010b. Eat colour by April & May. Trendland blog, [blog] 21 September, Available at: <http://trendland. net/2010/09/21/eat-color-by-april-may/> [Accessed 15/10/10].

The Beauty of Diagrams Episodes 1-6. 2010 [Television Series] BBC. BBC Four, shown weekly 18th November 2010 – 23rd December. 20.30.

The Semiotics of Colour, 2007. [online] Available at: <http://www.christianfaur.com/color/Site/Color%20Semiotics.html> [Accessed 30/09/10].

TUFTE, E. J., 2003. What color is your salmon, flamingo, leaf, soil, golden retriever, yolk, beer, diesel fuel? Measuring color in the field. Edward Tufte blog, [blog] 27 May, Available at: <http://www.edwardtufte.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_ id=0000XT> [Accessed 19/09/10].

TURNBULL, A., 2002. Spring snow – a translation. London: Bookworks.

UltraWideScreen, 2009. Think Pink from “Funny Face” in Wide Screen. [video online] Available at: <http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=zcCN6XA61Es> [Accessed 20/11/10].

What Colour Names are Supported in HTML, 2010. [online] Available at: <http://www.cryer.co.uk/resources/javascript/html2. htm> [Accessed 23/09/10].

Wikipedia, 2010. Puce. [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puce> [Accessed 12/10/10].

Wikipedia, 2010. Distinguishing Blue from Green in Language. [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Distinguishing_blue_from_green_in_language> [Accessed 12/10/10].

Wikipedia, 2010. List of Colours. [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_colors> [Accessed 09/08/10].

Wikipedia, 2010. Law of Identity. [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_identity> [Accessed 12/09/10].

Wikipedia, 2010. Linguistic relativity and the colour naming debate. [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Linguistic_relativity_and_the_color_naming_debate> [Accessed 12/09/10].

Major Project Proposal

Wikipedia, 2010. Crayola. [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crayola> [Accessed 17/09/10].

Wikipedia, 2010. List of Crayola coloured pencil colours. [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Crayola_ colored_pencil_colors> [Accessed 17/09/10].

Wikipedia, 2010. List of Crayola crayon colours. [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Crayola_crayon_ colors> [Accessed 17/09/10].

Wikipedia, 2010. Munsell colour system. [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munsell> [Accessed 17/09/10].

Wikipedia, 2010. Colour Term. [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_term> [Accessed 17/09/10].

Wikipedia, 2010. E number. [online] Available at: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E_number#E100.

E2.80.93E199_.28colours.29> [Accessed 17/09/10].

World Colour Survey, 2006. WCS Data Archives. [online] Available at: <http://www.icsi.berkeley.edu/wcs/data.html> [Accessed 30/09/10].

X-rite, 2010. Online Colour Challenge. [online] Available at: <http://www.xrite.com/custom_page.aspx?PageID=77&Lang=en> [Accessed 28/11/10].

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Proposed Reading List

46

ALBERS, J., 2006. Interaction of colour. New Haven : Yale University Press.

ANDERSON FEISNER, E., 2006. Colour : how to use colour in art and design. London : Laurence King.

BATCHELOR, D. ed. 2008. Colour. Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press.

BERLIN, B. & KAY, P., 1999. Basic colour terms : their universaility and evolution. Stanford : Center for the Study of Language and Information.

GAGE, J., 1999. Colour and meaning: art, science and symbolism. London : Thames & Hudson.

GAGE, J., 1999. Colour and culture: practice and meaning from antiquity to abstraction. Berkeley : University of California Press.

GIBSON, J., 1968. The senses considered as a perceptual system. London : George Allen & Unwin.

GOETHE, L. W., 2006. Theory of colours. Mineola, N.Y. : Dover.

HARDIN, C. L., 1988. Colour for philosophers. Indianapolis : Hackett Publishing Company.

HARDIN, C. L., 1997. Colour categories in thought and language. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press.

HARRIS, J., & KAMVAR, S., 2009. We Feel Fine: An Almanac of Human Emotion. New York : Scribner.

KLANTEN, R., ed. 2008. Data flow: visualising information in graphic design. Berlin : Gestalten.

KLANTEN, R., ed. 2010. Data flow 2 : visualising information in graphic design. Berlin : Gestalten.

MAERZ, A., & PAUL, R. 1953. A dictionary of colour. New York : Crowell.

MCCANDLESS. D., 2010. Information is beautiful. London : Collins.

PATERSON, I., 2004. A dictionary of colour : a lexicon of the language of colour. London : Thorogood.

RUNGE, P. O., 2010. Color sphere. New York : Princeton Architectural Press.

SCHOPENHAUER, A., 2010. On vision and colors. New York : Princeton Architectural Press.

TUFTE, E.R., 1990. Envisioning information. Cheshire, Conn. : Graphics Press.

TUFTE, E.R., 2001. The visual display of quantitative information. 2nd ed. Cheshire, Conn. : Graphics Press.

VENN, A., & VENN-ROSKY, J., 2010. The colour dictionary. the colourfulness of the words. Munich : Callwey Verlag.

WITTGENSTEIN, L., 1979. Remarks on colour. Oxford : Blackwell.

Major Project Proposal

Websites

http://www.visualcomplexity.com/vc/ http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/ http://flowingdata.com/ http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog http://infosthetics.com/ http://wefeelfine.org/ http://www.emotionallyvague.com/ http://www.colourphon.co.uk/ http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/ http://www.pantone.com http://www.colour-journal.org/ http://www.sdc.org.uk/

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â&#x20AC;&#x153;To discuss colour terms is, it seems, to talk about language more than it is to talk about colour.â&#x20AC;?

Batchelor (2000, pp.92)