COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF CONNOTATIVE MEANINGS OF COLOURS IN DIFFERENT WORLD CULTURES

Abstract

The article presents a comparative analysis of the connotative meanings of colours on the basis of phraseological units and established expressions in Ukrainian, English and German. The aim of the study is to identify common and distinctive lexical connotations of colour and to find out the indicator of universality or cultural specificity of these meanings.The relevance of the topic is determined by the increasing interest in studying the cognitive aspects of colours as a lexical and semantic group and the need for a deeper understanding of the linguistic picture of the world formed as a result of cultural and historical factors.The paper focuses on phraseological units and fixed expressions that include the main names of colours including white, black, red, yellow, green and blue. Each colour is examined in detail as a holder of culturally determined associations, symbolic meanings and social evaluations.The article analyses an array of material from the Ukrainian, English and German languages, which is representative of these language systems. The article shows that the connotative meanings of colours are mostly universal, but in some cases they are culturally specific. In particular, we found that white has a universal connotation of purity, innocence, anxiety, formality and death; black has a universal connotation of danger, sadness and grief; red has a universal connotation of shame, embarrassment, anger, danger, warning, importance; yellow represents cowardice, envy, joy, success; blue stands for emotional and mental states, social status, natural phenomena; green for youth, inexperience, nature, life, money, material goods, envy and positive changes.The article proves that colours play a significant role as markers of ethno-cultural stereotypes, reproduce the values of society and perform an identification function in shaping the mentality. The obtained results can be used in comparative linguistics, cognitive linguistics, ethnolinguistic, linguacultural studies, translation studies and intercultural communication. The article outlines the prospects for further research.