Bears and why they mostly are called otherwise

[Richard M. Alderson III]

On Mon, 13 Mar 2000, John McLaughlin (mclasutt at brigham.net) wrote:

> "Orange" is not a basic color term in Modern English, since it is still
> recognized as being the color of the fruit. ...  "Brown" is moving into this
> class, but since we still have "bruin" in our language, it's not quite there
> yet.  "Pink" is closer to being a basic term than "orange", since only
> gardeners recognize "pink" as a name for a member of the genus Dianthus.

This is certainly a matter of dialect or idiolect:  For me, all three are basic
in the B&K sense.  As a child, I learned that the fruit was called "an orange"
because it *was* orange, I never associated "brown" with "bruin" (an adult
learned term), and I had a pink shirt and necktie (with Davy Crockett on it)
that was my favourite thing to wear when I was three.  Even as an occasional
gardener, "pinks" are called that because they are...

								Rich Alderson