transparent: fci__ryellow' + mi. 'body'. Interestingly,
Both points of view will be considered as we turn to examine kiiro as a synaesthetic transfer.
K iiroi Koe as an I n t r i n si c Sensory C o r r e s p o n d e n c e. If there were some innate intersensory correspondence between the colour kiiro and high-pitched sound,
one could expect this synaesthetic relation to
be expressed through language (i.e. verbal synaesthesia); but of the twenty-nine languages Kikuchi and Lichtenberk
(1983) have examined for semantic extension in their colour lexicons, only the Japanese language is seen to possess such an expression of sensory unity, i.e. kiiroi koe. This does not mean, though, that a hypothesis based on 'intrinsic appropriateness' between yellow and high pitch should be dismissed: For as Hartshorne (1934:59) notes "There is one experience of intersensory resemblance which is- peculiarly obvious to everyone. This is the
intuiting of the 'brightness' of high-pitched sounds".
Indeed, the literature on 'coloured-hearing' synaesthesia abounds with correspondences between brightness and high
pitch, be it the brightness of high-pitched vowels, musical notes or musical instruments. Marks (1975), presenting his research on the brightness of colour linked
synaesthetically to vowel sounds, sums up his results: Yellowness was most often associated with
tones of high frequency, blueness with tones of low frequency. Extrapolation
of this outcome to the synaesthetic colours of vowels would suggest that sound frequency, probably frequency of the second formant, should predict yellowness, (p.311).
Although Marks’ results were obtained from genuine synaesthetes, where high-pitched sounds actually induced visual images of yellowness, it must be remembered that non-synaesthetes have similar experiences with 'pitch brightness', and this is often exposed in language via metaphor:
Most synaesthetic metaphors that are perceived immediately as appropriate (and maybe even some that are not) derive largely from the same primordal unity of the senses that expresses
itself in sensory synaesthesia. Such metaphors typically convey intrinsic correspondences through dimensions like brightness or affect that are common to
many or all sense modalities. (Marks,1978:213) Commenting on a particular metaphor taken from one of Conrad A-iken' s poems^, "shrill bells of silver", Marks
(1978:213) notes: "There are relatively few colours that may be deemed proper to go with shrill sounds. Silver stands out. Consider, by way of comparison, shrill blue, shrill black, or worse yet, shrill purple". Indeed,
although 'shrill yellow' is not specifically mentioned, one intuitively feels certain that its inclusion as an example of metaphoric 'appropriateness' would pass unquestioned.
Concerning partial synaesthetic metaphors, such as loud colours and bright notes, which identify the sensory quality of only a single modality, Marks (1978:214) has the following to say:
Indeed, we may infer that the use of partial, intrinsic metaphors find its justification in the existence of natural intermodal correspondences. It is presumably because people can comprehend what bright or silvery
sounds are — that they are high pitched, relatively loud (in the case of bright sounds), perhaps staccato — that these phrases have communicative value.
What we may conclude by all this, then, is that the innate correspondence between brightness and high pitch, which does seem to exist among synaesthetes and non-synaesthetes alike, may manifest in language through metaphor (including 'partial' metaphor), and, that this intersensory connection surfaces in the Japanese language by the designation of an actual hue perceived as 'bright', i.e. fetiro, while in English on the other hand, the term bright itself is employed to express the same synaesthetic
correspondence: bright sound, bright note^ .
However, this indeed can only be one explanation for kiiroi koe„ The colour 'white', for instance, may be regarded as a colour of extreme brilliance, yet in French, voix blanche means a 'toneless voice'
(Kikuchi & Lichtenberk,1983:43) -- not the expected meaning of 'extremely high-pitched' -- and cannot,
therefore, be predicted by a theory of innate intersensory correspondence.
On the other hand, it is difficult to accept the
fact that the association between blanche 'nothingness' 9. Of particular note, this situation in English has
interesting twist in German: Visually 'bright' in German, hell, originally meant auditionally 'high- pitched' (Hartshorne,1934:61,fn.24).
(i.e. 'toneless' when applied to voice quality)^ is purely culture-specific -- the association between
'white' (i.e. 'colourless') and 'nothingness' is certainly not a remote concept for the English-speaking culture, and most probably for many others (if not perhaps all) --- which once again points to a theory based on innate, or possibly universally learned experiences, rather than on cultural associations. Moreover, there have been
a number of studies done under the heading of 'synaesthesia' on the associations between colours and emotions (see,
for example, Odbert, Karwoski & Eckerson,1942; Osgood,1960; D'Andrande & Egan,1974) which have revealed consistent
results between distinct culture groups, that would seem to give credence to a theory based on some variety of synaesthetic innateness.
In -colour-emotion synaesthesia, the colour 'yellow' has been associated with 'joy' and 'gaiety' (Hartshorne,
1934), 'playfulness' (Odbert,el al.,1942), and 'cheerfulness' (D'Andrande,et a l . ,1974). This fits in well.with what
has already been said about kiivoi koe -- i.e. that
it is a type of high-pitched voice particularly associated with teenage (girls') merriment. It should also be noted however that, when applied to women's voices, kiiroi koe is used disparagingly to imply that women with such voices are behaving immaturely. It is interesting to note here Hartshorne's (1934:233) comments on his own synaesthetic experience:
1 0. I.e. blanche 'white': devoid of hue tone.
...The most joyous notes would accordingly be yellow-like and high...The merriest sounds must be such high-pitched ones as those of children's or women's laughter...
It would seem obvious by now that the status of kiiroi koe has become blurred. It is no longer possible
to say whether kiiroi {koe) is associated with 'gaiety' by some underlying innate (colour-emotion) synaesthesia, or whether it is a universally learned (i.e. associative) synaesthesia that is involved, since it is at the height of gaiety that children and women's voices are at their heighest pitch.
k i i r o i Koe as a (Culturally) A ss oc ia t iv e Sensory