Visual Thinking and the Arab Semantic Memory

Abstract

In this article the Arabic vocabulary on a visual perception is explored, on the basis of recent scientific contributions regarding the relationship between words and visual expression in the human brain. By analyzing Arabic tenns related to primal signs, such as lines or drawings, as well as terms that articulate essential functions in communication and aesthetics in the area of vision and creation of shapes, a systematic ambivalence and ambiguity between the visual and the verbal is revealed. This phenomenon stems from the very way language is formed, and the intercommunication between the two areas of the brain that control words and hand, respectively. Finally, the author studies the particular system that Arabic uses for naming colours and highlights the high level of perfection this people achieved when describing the different colour hues present in their dessert envíronment.