Construction and Semantics of Idioms with Colors in Mu'jam at-Ta'bir al-Ishthilahi fi al-Arabiyat al-Mu’ashirah

Construction and Semantics of Idioms with Colors in Mu'jam


Introduction
Idioms are common language facts in all languages that enrich the language repertoire and express the culture of the language community.The term idiom is defined variously by linguists.In the Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia (Pusat Bahasa, 2008), the idiom is "a form of language in the form of a combination of words whose meaning cannot be interpreted with the combined elements".It is a "special habit in a language".Hoctket in Makkai (1972) argues that idiom is a general term that refers to lexicographic and syntactic phenomena whose meaning cannot be predicted through their composition.Khudoyberdievna defines idioms as "stable combinations of lexemes with meanings that must be reinterpreted, either wholly or partially with a high connotative proportion" (Khudoyberdievna, 2022).Robert in Staller explains that idioms contain syntactic constructions with various elements with unpredictable meanings.Analyzing various definitions of idioms, Husain concluded that idioms are Damhuri, Ratni Bt.Hj.Bahri, Satriana Mokodongan: Construction and Semantics of Idioms with Colors in Mu'jam at-Ta'bir al-Ishthilahi fi al-Arabiyat al-Mu'ashirah -41 -special expression patterns in a particular language composed of two or more words whose meaning differs from their lexical meaning.The construction becomes a semantic unit that contains the meaning of metaphorical or connotative characteristics (Jürg Strässler, 1982).Idioms are found in the languages of all nations and are a form of expression unique to that nation.The existence of such expressions has been a tradition in all societies for generations (Cacciari & Tabossi, 2014).Idioms as figurative language have a difference from their denotation meaning.According to Za'ba in Enid Zureen Zainal Abidin et al., 'all languages have idioms, proverbs, and similes.The number of idioms in each language is influenced by the development of the language and its speaking community.Idioms are a common phenomenon in every language.They cannot be separated from the language-speaking community in daily use.Idioms have a special meaning formed from a combination of words or phrases that are not the same as the original meaning of each word that forms it.Idioms also have a high degree of ambiguity because they have a literal meaning that is widely used, and at the same time carry an implied idiomatic meaning" (Haq, 2020).
In terms of the structure of its formation, idioms use various elements to form it variably in each nation.The culture of a particular group of language speakers strongly influences this.In English, for example, as stated by Siedl and McMordie in Nurcholisho, idioms often use words related to animals, colors, parts of the human body, and time (Nurcholisho, 2017).The word components that make up idioms in Arabic are heavily influenced by words commonly used in the Arab community.al-Bathal in Nurkholiso asserts that culture reflects the outlook and lifestyle adopted by a particular language community.Members of this community see things from the point of view of their habits.Therefore, idioms that include specialized words hint at the importance of these words in producing the connotative meanings that arise (Nurcholisho, 2017).
The element of color is one of the elements forming idioms in various languages, including Arabic.The use of color in idioms often reflects deep connotative meanings and results from cultural interpretations and people's experiences.Each group of language speakers has a distinctive preference regarding color.It illustrates that colors have an impact on human emotions and thoughts.Each color has a unique character and is closely related to aspects of human life.How a person feels affects how that person views the color itself.In Indonesian, the idiom "Minggu Kelabu" (gray Sunday) is associated with sadness.In Western society, the same connotation of the term is expressed with "Blue Monday" by the color blue as an element of sadness.It is certainly influenced by the cultural differences of a society in symbolizing these emotions (Khory Aik Kumala Dewi, 2018).
In Arabic, words referring to colors are often used to describe certain moods, characteristics, or situations.For example, idioms involving color can enrich expression and give an emotional dimension to communication.For example, "al-qalb al-aswad" (black heart) in Arabic can refer to a mood of sorrow or depression.At the same time, a "al-wajh al-ahmar" (red face) can indicate embarrassment or anger.Using color in idioms also creates a strong visual image, allowing the listener or reader to understand better and feel the context of the sentence.Therefore, color in Arabic idioms has become an important means of expressing nuances, feelings, and experiences more colorfully in everyday communication.
From the aspect of construction, idioms in Arabic are quite diverse and unpredictable.Zairul Haq asserts that the grammatical construction of idioms in Arabic is unpredictable.The preposition ‫ﻋ‬ ‫ﻠ‬ ‫ﻰ‬ , for example, when it stands alone, its meaning can still be ascertained.However, when the preposition is included in constructing an idiom, its meaning cannot be determined using grammatical clues (Haq, 2022).The problem of meaning in idioms is not just grammatical.However, it is related to various influencing aspects such as cultural and social.Linking a word with a particular word gives birth to a new meaning, which will differ when the word is linked to another word.This research does not intend to standardize the construction but rather to map it in the case of the corpus under study.Muna Fauzi Hasan pointed out the general construction characteristics of Arabic idioms, including the fact that they are composed of two or more words, so single words are not included in the idiom category.Second, the construction is relatively stable and used as it is.It cannot be changed by doing taqdim or ta'khir, dropping one of its elements, adding another element, or replacing it with another word.The classification does not describe the grammatical patterns used in idioms.
Regarding the possibility of predicting the meaning of its construction, Suwandi categorizes idioms into two categories: full and partial.A full idiom is a type of idiom whose meaning cannot be fully understood or interpreted based on its elements.Meanwhile, partial idioms (semi-idioms) still have a meaning that can be interpreted from the components that make up them because they are still related to the lexical meaning of the forming elements.Meanwhile, In her grouping, Wasrie in Siti Hajar and Heni Purniawati mentions seven categories of idioms.However, of the seven types, only partial idioms are included in this category.The rest are types of idioms in terms of their forming elements (Hajar & Purniawati, 2020).Chaer in Ho Ngoc Hieu et al (Hieu et al., 2022) also categorizes idioms from the readability of the meaning of the word constructions that form them into full and partial idioms.Full idioms are idioms whose elements have merged into a single entity with a meaning that cannot be predicted lexically or grammatically.In contrast, partial idioms refer to idioms that still contain elements that have their lexical meanings.On that basis, the categorization carried out in this study in terms of the relationship between meaning and the forming word is grouped into full and partial idioms.
Many previous researchers have researched idioms in general using various approaches.Research on idioms with the approach of the word elements that form them is also quite numerous and diverse, including studies of idioms with human organs, animal names, fruits, natural objects, weapons, kinship, shio names, feelings, activities, sexual, verbs, nouns, adjectives, and consonants.Research specifically examining idioms with color elements was conducted by Kumala Dewi and Miftachul Amri, who compared the meaning of idioms in Japanese and Indonesian that contain color elements (Khory Aik Kumala Dewi, 2018).Vivi Chen compares the meaning of red in Indonesian and Mandarin proverbs.(Chen& Yan Khiong, 2023) Yakovleva compared color naming categories in English, German, and Mari idioms (Yakovleva et al., 2015).Aizharykovna examines the translation strategies of color idioms in English into Karakalpak, one of the Turkic language families (Aizharykovna, 2023).Alotaibi conducted research on Arabic idioms by comparing the meaning of color idioms in Arabic and English by looking at aspects of their meaning (Alotaibi, 2020).In this research, the author examines color idioms in Mu'jam at-Ta'bir al- This study emphasizes the connotations of each color in Arabic culture, using a collection of Arabic idioms as a data source.In addition, the uniqueness of this research also lies in the exploration of the construction of color idioms that have not been touched by previous researchers.

Method
This research is library research.The main data source used is Mu'jam at-Ta'bir al-Ishthilahi fi al-'Arabiyat al-Mu'ashirah.At the same time, secondary data sources are Arabic dictionaries, encyclopedias, journal articles, and books that discuss idioms.Because the research data is written data, the reading technique is used for the data collection stage (Sugiarti, 2020) to find data in the form of idioms with color elements and note-taking techniques by recording data (Mahsun, 2017) that were identified as idioms.Furthermore, the data that has been identified is classified based on the colors that make up the idiom.Analyzing the data refers to the structural analysis procedure proposed by Zaim (2014): sorting out the determining elements of idiom indicators in each data set by considering grammatical, semantic, and stylistic aspects.

Finding 3.1. Color as an idiom shaper
Based on the research on Mu'jam at-Ta'birat al-Ishthilahiyah fi al-Arabiyat al-Mu'ashirah, there are five essential color categories form idioms with varying frequencies, including white, black, yellow, green, and red.For the color white, fourteen data were found, as shown in Table 1.For idioms with black color elements, 14 data were also found as shown in Table 2. Idioms with yellow color elements, five data were found as in Table 3.The data above shows that the connotation of color in Arabic idioms, especially modern Arabic, is not a fixed connotation for something good or bad.However, the data above shows that white dominates the positive connotation of as much as 20%, and black has a negative connotation of as much as 28%.However, black and white are also used for positive and negative connotations.Similarly, red is used for both positive and negative meanings.In contrast, yellow and green in the analyzed data are used in negative connotations, and no positive connotations are found.
The frequency of use of these color connotations is depicted in the Figure 1.
Figure 1.Frequency of color connotations in Arabic idioms

Category of color idioms
As stated earlier, idioms regarding the closeness of the forming elements are categorized into full and partial idioms.Full idioms are phrases or groups of words with a special meaning that cannot be predicted based on the lexical meaning of the elements that form them.This category of idioms expresses a more complex meaning than the literal meaning of the words that make it up.A partial idiom is a type of expression where the meaning can still be related to the individual meanings of the words that make it up.
In this study, it was found that idioms with color elements are full idioms and partial idioms.Full idioms can be seen in the Table 7 data examples: Table 7. Full idioms that reaches 28%.The data also does not negate the use of the color black in the Arabic tradition, which contains positive connotations, and the color white contains negative connotations, although in a small frequency.The same goes for the color red, which simultaneously refers to positive and negative connotations.On the other hand, in the analyzed data, yellow and green are used with negative connotations, and no uses indicate positive connotations.
In the context of the possibility of guessing meaning based on the constituent elements, full idioms and partial idioms are found in color idioms.Full idioms express meanings that are more complex than the literal meanings of the words that compose them, making it difficult to guess their meaning just by looking at the lexical meaning of the words that compose them.Idioms such as " " are lexically formed from the words al-hishan, which means 'horse', and al-aswad, which means 'black', resulting in the lexical meaning of 'the black horse'.The meaning of the word construction gave birth to a new meaning: "a nickname for a team that is not considered a favorite or underestimated to become a champion, but wins unexpectedly".On the other hand, a partial idiom is a type of expression where the meaning is still related to the individual meanings of the words that make it up.
Furthermore, partial idioms involve combinations of words that result in a new meaning but can still be guessed or anticipated from the words that form them due to the similarity between the lexical meaning and the idiom's meaning with one of the words involved in its formation.Idioms such as ' ‫ﻟا‬ ‫ﺴ‬ ‫ﻮ‬ ‫ق‬ ‫ا‬ ‫ﻷ‬ ‫ﺳ‬ ‫ﻮ‬ ‫د‬ ' means illegal market.An idiom like this is predictable, as there are words that remain in their lexical meaning, i.e., as-suq (market), and then aswad (black) is connoted with something negative.
The data of this study shows four categories of construction, including N+Adj, an idiom formed from isim, and adjectives, which then form descriptive phrases.In this construction, color becomes an attribute element in all data, and none becomes the phrase's core element.This construction pattern dominates with 38 cases with a percentage of 93%; the next construction is a series of intransitive verbs (fi''il lazim) + noun (ism), which grammatically forms the number of fi'liyah.This pattern has a very small frequency, which is only 1 (one) case.In addition, there is a verbal sentence construction with the pattern: Verba (fi'il) with an unspecified object, followed by a Preposition (letter jar), and an adjective.This type of pattern is only found in 1 (one) case.The last construction follows the pattern: verb + Preposition + adjective + conjunction ('athaf) + adjective.This type has only 1 (one) case.
In terms of grammatical constructions of idioms in Arabic, no research has been found that summarizes all of these constructions, which are also unpredictable because idioms refer to language styles in a limited community, which is then used popularly in the speaking community.

Conclusion
The color element is one of the elements forming idioms in Arabic.In constructing idioms with color elements, white and black are the dominant colors in forming idioms.White and black colors are repeated as much as 14 data each, yellow color element five data, green color element four data, and red color element four data.The white color is dominated by positive connotations (7 data), and there are uses of white with negative connotations (4 data) and neutral connotations (3 data).In contrast, black is dominated by negative connotations (11 data), and there are positive connotations (1 data) and neutral (1 data).Yellow and green are not found to be used in positive connotations, only in negative ones.Each yellow (4 data) has a negative connotation, and one data has a neutral connotation.While the color red is not found in neutral connotations, only positive (1 data) and negative (3 data) connotations.
In addition to the aspects of the use of types of colors and connotations of meaning, there are two categories of idioms in terms of the lexical meaning of the constituent elements, found in the category of full idioms and partial idioms.Full idioms, for example, are found in the expression "al-hishan al-aswad".The word that forms the idiom cannot be guessed only with the help of lexical meaning but requires a socio-cultural point of view of the speaking community.Another handy with the expression "as-suq al-aswad", there is still a word that maintains its meaning lexically, namely "as-suq", so the possibility of guessing its meaning is not too difficult for non-Arab speakers due to the similarity of meaning between lexical meanings and idiom meaning with one of the words involved in its formation.
In the grammatical construction of color idioms, there are three construction categories: First, the construction N+Adj, an idiom formed from isim, and adjectives that form washfi phrases (shifah wal maushuf).The color elements in this construction are all attribute elements and are not found to be core elements in the phrase.The construction of washfi phrases forms the majority of idioms (38 cases) or as much as 93%.Second, the construction that follows the pattern V. intr (fi''il lazim) followed by a noun forms the structure of the sum of fi'liyah, with a very small frequency (1 case).Third, the construction follows the pattern: verb (fi'il) with a hidden object (mustatir), followed by a preposition or jar ( ‫ﻋ‬ ‫ﻠ‬ ‫ﻰ‬ ), and followed by an adjective, and this pattern is only one case.Fourth, the construction with the pattern: verb +preposition + adjective + conjunction ('athaf) +adjective.This type has only one case.This study's findings have several theoretical implications for the field of linguistics, particularly in the study of idiomatic expressions and their cultural significance.The prevalence and connotations of color elements in Arabic idioms suggest that color symbolism is deeply ingrained in the language, reflecting broader cultural values and perceptions.The differentiation between full and partial idioms highlights the necessity for cultural and contextual understanding in language learning and translation.Educators and translators must consider these cultural nuances to accurately convey meanings and avoid misinterpretations.Furthermore, the predominance of certain grammatical constructions in forming idioms suggests a structured pattern that can be systematically studied and taught, providing a framework for further linguistic analysis and educational approaches in teaching Arabic as a foreign language.

Ratni Bt. Hj. Bahri, Satriana Mokodongan: Construction
construction, category, and connotation of the use of color in Arabic idiom,swhicheares popular in modern Arab society.Literature review shows that previous studies are dominated by comparative studies between Arabic and other foreign languages, with an emphasis on how both languages view the use of certain colors.

Table 1 .
Idioms with the color white

Table 2 .
Idioms with the color black

Table 3 .
Idioms with the color yellowIdioms with green color elements, four data were found, as in Table4.

Table 4 .
Idioms with the color green