A contrastive study of colour terms in French and German causal constructions

The contrastive study explores the conceptualization of colours in different speech communities, as they are realized in causal constructions, e.g. Je suis rouge de colère (lit. ‘I am red of rage’) or Er ist grün vor Neid (lit.‘He is green of jealousy’). The theoretical framework for the description of such causal constructions is based on Goldberg’s model of Construction Grammar (1995, 2006) and on the concepts of metaphor and metonymy. Colour terms are associated with specific emotions, but also with positive or negative values dependent on the speech community when used in the causal construction. The study investigates the differences in frequency, meaning and use of colour terms in the causal construction in French and German and reports on the results of a comparative survey conducted with French and German natives. The survey allows to define the preferred colours in both speech communities and to highlight the differences in conceptualization