Colourful Language: Expressions colorées

About ths blog : Communicating in any language

Art and illustration and gardening, and two languages: English and French - is there a link other than these activities being of interest to me ?

This question has arisen with my decision to launch this blog with my thoughts on what I do. Certainly, these are the interests and skills that I have acquired as I've stumbled along, sometimes with very little idea of where I'm going but are they too disparate for a single blog, which needs focus ? Possibly, but maybe they are linked by more than serendipity ?

As I've found that studying a language, art and more recently gardening, have put me in touch with people with whom I might otherwise not have had any contact, I can't help wondering if the common denominator is less my interest than the communication these activities have generated.
Learning a language, understanding another culture, is definitely about communication but so too is art where of course the language is visual. Gardening also facilitates communication (say it with flowers ?) as does any activity that allows you to link with people, share and exchange ideas. Sport - I do that too - is another way of coming together, pooling efforts and enjoying shared experiences. So maybe the link is the committed, constructive and creative use of our time that allows us all as individuals to be part of something bigger than ourselves : a community ?

Moreover, gardening, like art and illustration, but also learning to communicate in another language, creates colour (literally and metaphorically) in our lives and makes people... smile. And isn't the best way to start a conversation with a smile ?

So, perhaps when explaining what I do, which sometimes I find difficult to do because I don't fit easily into any nice, neat category, I should say : "I'm a communicator".

Wednesday, 19 November 2008

Expressions colorées - Colourful Expressions

So why Expressions colorées or, to give its literal back-translation, colourful expressions ?

According to the Hachette (French monolingual) dictionary that I have on my computer, an "expression" is a linguistic, corporal, visual or artistic demonstration of a thought and/or a feeling.

And "coloré" (or "colourful") ? We're talking adjectives, of course : an adjective that describes something that has colour, particularly bright colour. So, "a colourful style", for example, is a style that stands out by its use of imagery.

A nice description of my blog, I think.