Color Association in Different cultures
Depending on the culture, what a color means can be very different. In Taiwan, a person wearing a green hat will make others think that his or her spouse has not been faithful. Yellow means that the person might be a harlot. In China, white is seen as the color for mourning and funerals as opposed to black that’s more common in the West. This is believed by some to be because Hinduism and Buddhism – two of the most popular religions there – both see death as the move to a higher and better plane of existence. Because of that, death has a much more positive connotation. In the West, death is generally seen as an ending and therefore the negative connotation that comes with the color black makes more sense to the average American person, as well as to many people in Europe.
In Islam, gold and green are the colors for Paradise, and green and blue are common colors in that country for many things. They are seen in and around most of the mosques and they are important for peace and happiness. In the United States and other traditionally Christian countries, color is not as associated with church, but it is associated with many Christian holidays. Purple and pastel colors are for Easter, green for Christmas, etc. When a person goes from one country to another, he or she often forgets that it’s not only the language and the food that changes. The culture is totally different, too, and that means that the way that color is presented and interpreted will be different. Even within a culture there will be differences based on other demographics, but they won’t be as pronounced as the more standard opinions that a culture holds overall.
These are just a few examples of colors and their associations that not everyone will be familiar with. There are some more common ones, like green for luck and red for love, but not all countries see things this way. It can be a poor choice to assume that you know what another culture means by a specific color, so asking questions is a good idea. You can also do some research if you’re planning a trip to another country so you know a bit about their culture before you leave. You can avoid offending people that way, get a better understanding of culture and how color affects us, and have a more enjoyable trip.
Cymbolism and color sensitivity | Wisdump
August 6th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
[...] Based on the results, if you’re going to design one of those typical Web 2.0 badges that say “NEW!”, which color are you going to go with? It’s harder to choose now, isn’t it? I’m not implying that the site is useless in helping you decide colors. In fact, it teaches a very important lesson in color sensitivity. As the latest article in Cymbolism’s blog points out: [...]
n/a
October 14th, 2008 at 12:14 pm
Should’t the voting include the country/culture of the person doing the voting. We could then see what colors are voted for based on a specific culture/country compared to all users in general. It would be much more useful then.
iisbum
October 16th, 2008 at 2:44 pm
@n/a: Yes ideally we’d have a complete profile of everyone that voted and exactly what they voted on, but how many users do you know that would be willing to provide that information to cast a vote on a fun little site like this?