A Cognitive Analysis of Conceptual Metaphors of Color Idioms in English and Chinese Based on Data Mining

Abstract

There are many color-related idioms in English and Chinese. The use of color in idioms adds beautiful color to the expression of language. Due to the differences in national culture, “color idioms” bring different cultural imprint. It is of great significance to accurately understand and grasp the meaning and difference between Chinese and English color-related idioms. Color is a precious gift from god to mankind, and it is a great masterpiece. There are also a large number of color words in both English and Chinese. Color metaphor is not only a very important tool for us humans to understand the cognitive world, but it is also a language phenomenon and cognitive system. The article briefly introduces the concepts and important features of conceptual metaphors, and then compares and analyzes the similarities and differences between English and Chinese. There are a lot of idioms and proverbs about colors in English and Chinese languages, and these languages have deep cultural accumulation behind them. Therefore, these words show different degrees of semantic equivalence in expressing linguistic meaning. However, due to differences in cultural backgrounds such as national customs, geographical environment, thinking forms, religious beliefs, and national psychology, the visual and psychological associations, cultural connotations, and meanings of color words produced by various nationalities are different from each other.