Secondary Colour Terms in British Beauty Products: Structure, Semantics, Word-formation

Abstract

The article deals with cultural, structural and semantic peculiarities of secondary colour terms used in British beauty products. A secondary colour term may be significant aesthetically, culturally, socially, historically, psychologically and linguistically. Secondary colour terms of beauty products reflect people’s experience, mentality, their interpretations of objective reality, their cultural traditions and language features. Such terms may be both universal and ethnospesific. The largest thematic groups of colour terms under analysis are the following: «colours», «flowers», «natural phenomena», «jewels». Minor thematic groups are «monarch», «sweets», «fauna». The most productive word-formation means are word-composition, affixation, blending, shortening.

Keywords

• a colour term
• secondary colour term
• cultural linguistics
• beauty products
• semantics
• structure
• word-formation
• thematic group