Basic Color Terms in the Glorious Qur’an
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Abstract
Colour plays a key role in people’s communication. Languages represent the gradation of colours in nature by a series of discrete categories. These categories of colour differ along with the different cultures. Colour distinctions and meanings also play a major role in different religions. A certain colour may have a particular meaning in Christianity and another different meaning. There is no single language is said to include all colour variations. Colour distinctions and meanings play a major role in different religions. A certain colour may have a particular meaning in Christianity and another different meaning. This paper aims at identifying the basic colour terms in the Glorious Qur'an and making structural and semantic analyses of them. It is hypothesized that the Glorious Qur’an contains particular colour terms that occupy various grammatical classes and indicates specific functions. Furthermore, some are linked to each other by semantic relations. The major findings arrived at are the following: there are six basic colour terms used in the Glorious Qur’an; they are white, black, green, yellow, blue, and red. Colour terms used in the Glorious Qur’an have various structures in Arabic syntax. Secondly, semantic variations are found in many verses of the Glorious Qur’an that include colour terms. Thirdly, cultural differences affect the usage of colour in language. Finally, the use of colour terms in the Glorious Qur’an is meant to apply different functions of the terms, such as the visual, the aesthetic, the symbolic, and the expressive functions. one colour might be interpreted in one way in a language and in a totally different way in another.
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