The unrepresentable and ineffable

Abstract

While colour seems to communicate values that fluctuate depending on cultures and eras, the attribution of emotional correlations to chromatic variations seems on the contrary to constitute a widespread tendency among human groups. Now, is it true that every language includes the notion of colour, as well the terms referring to colours? If certain cultural contexts are devoid of any representation of colour, and consequently of a nomenclature of individual colours, can we still talk about colour semantics, or of an emotional connotation of colours? The ethnography of a population native to the Upper Amazon, who assesses the colour-related sensory experiences without using one of our main descriptive tools – colour names – will give us the opportunity to reflect on what we could call an oxymoron: defining what’s ineffable.