Describe Yellow To A Blind Person

I work at the front desk of a music school, and I was chatting with one of the students who was waiting for his lesson. He was describing one of his homework assignments. It was to describe the color yellow to a blind person.

I was instantly disgusted. On top of being incredibly stupid (on the order of trying to explain quantum mechanics to a turtle), it was offensive to think that a color can be explained to people who have never seen.

As if it wasn't already dumb enough, the assignment goes out of its way to say that you can't use objects that are yellow already like the sun or a school bus. 

That said, there is one interesting from this assignment: it allows us to study how our culture values the color. Ask yourself what yellow feels like , how it smells or tastes like. These are questions which tell you about your culture, but they do not actually describe the color itself. They are based on knowing the color already. 

At the end of the day, this is a concept (describing a color) which is worth some merit, but to give as a reason "to teach the blind" is to sully the exercise with contempt.