<p>Hello,</p>
<p>I was wondering if it is possible and advisible to start two new languagues during the fall of your freshman year. Has anyone done this (you or someone you know)?</p>
<p>I want to start Chinese and Italian at the same time. I don't think Italian will be much of a problem because I am a native Spanish speaker and I have been taking French for 8 years (I have the Romance thing down...)</p>
<p>Suggestions?</p>
<p>No, it's not a good idea. It's very difficult to learn Chinese, because it's nothing like the Romance languages you've been learning. You may want to do one language at a time.</p>
<p>It's true, you shouldn't have too much trouble with Italian especially with your Romance languages background. Chinese though, takes over your life. No other university has such a good and intense Chinese program so no, I would not advise starting two new languages at the same time.</p>
<p>My roommate is planning on taking Spanish and Hebrew at the same time next year; she's going into second year Spanish and first year Hebrew. However, it's true that the Chinese program at Princeton is extremely intense (and amazingly effective -- I went to Chinese school for years, and I think that the first year students know more vocabulary and can discuss technical issues far better than I can). I think that it's possible, but won't be easy; if you want, you can talk to your adviser or residential college dean of studies about it when you get here.</p>
<p>Why don't you take 2 courses of Italian first year to get a good idea of the grammar. Then start Chinese the second year and continue Italian. This sounds reasonable if you're generally good at learning languages :)</p>
<p>italian is an extemely easy class especially if you already know spanish. it takes literally 3 or less hours a week. so i would actually advise that you take it at the same time as chinese which is an extremely hard class so you have some slack in your schedule</p>