Chinese or Portuguese? Which is more important?

Graduate School
1

<p>I've just been accepted to some top IR schools and I need to start thinking about which language to take. I'm interested in development/finance (i hope to explore both routes at various points in my career) in Latin America, and am already fluent in Spanish. I undesrtand Portuguese is critical because of Brazil's presence and clout in the region. However, China has been making large investments where the US has refused to, (I just heard that Bogota has been importing Chinese professors in large numbers), and I think in the long run, having Chinese in my arsenal will be handy. After all, I hear that Spanish speakers can pick up Portuguese in a year of self-study.</p>

<p>Any thoughts on this matter would be very much appreciated.</p>

2

<p>For your area, it may be better to learn Chinese, especially since Portuguese would be a breeze for you. You could probably just do a summer intensive Portuguese program and be done with it as far as communicating effectively. You may want to brush up on grammar and written skills later, but at least you will be able to speak it and understand it well. Chinese on the other hand involves a much longer commitment if you want to master it and knowing both Chinese AND Portuguese (and English and Spanish) will probably help you a LOT if your focus is going to be Latin America. Bonne chance !</p>

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<p>thanks for that applelinguist, you sound like you know what you're talking about. I'm curious though, do you think one can become conversational in Chinese after only two years of study (of course, assuming that I am studious and the instructors are good)?</p>

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<p>Free,</p>

<p>I take Chinese and it is fairly simple to become conversational with 2 years of somewhat intense learning. It is really hard to read, though, and very hard to master.</p>

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<p>I'm not sure...to me it seems like that would be difficult, aspecially since the sound patterns are so different. I guess it's possible to become conversational if you are diligent about it. Mastering reading and writing will probably take much longer, though someone with experience in Chinese may be able to adress this better.</p>

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<p>most definitely. I studied for a few months and picked up quite a bit. A year and would be solid in conversational Mandarin (but writing will invariably take much more time to become proficient).</p>

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<p>Speaking is easy, even with the tonalities. The thing with tones is that if you say something like "Wo ye hen hoa!" with the wrong tonaility, people are still going to know you just said "I am also very good!" but they will figure you are a tourist.</p>

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<p>Look at the total time requirement involved. You could likely learn all the other relevant Romance languages (French/Portuguese/Italian) for the time to learn a single dialect of Chinese.</p>

9

<p>
[quote]
Look at the total time requirement involved. You could likely learn all the other relevant Romance languages (French/Portuguese/Italian) for the time to learn a single dialect of Chinese.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Mr. Payne hit it on the head. It's me again, Freemumia. Did you get into Johns Hopkins SAIS?</p>

<p>I know both Mandarin (took it at Berkeley undergrad intensively one summer covering a year, lived in Taiwan/China for 3 years, finished it off at SAIS) and Portuguese (I've learned it on the fly and my girlfriend/fiancee soon to be wife is Brazilian and that's all we speak together). I took a bit of Spanish and German at SAIS after testing out of Mandarin.</p>

<p>Anyway, the purpose you stated is inadequate to the difficulty of learning Chinese. Chinese has really simple elements -- the grammar is, frankly, baby grammar. But tones are hard for people and not initially intuitive for westerners. Getting out of the habit of speaking an inflected (where emphasis is put on how words are pronounced tonally) versus a tonal language where tones don't change (though volume and intensity can) can be very difficult. It's best just to do it in China. Do you want to live in China for a year or two? Furthermore, learning to read and write is laborious. I (wisely) gave up on writing. I can read it, but counterintuitively for westerners reading it and writing it are completely different abilities. Take a look at a simple line drawing for 10 seconds. Turn it over and then try to recreate it line by line. Then compare that to the act of RECOGNIZING the same picture if someone showed it to you; obviously passive recognition takes a lot less. That is what reading Chinese versus writing is like for me. Plus, there are good word processing programs that tie the language to a phonetic system and therefore involve passive recognition as opposed to active re-creation. </p>

<p>And that's another thing: think of a language that's not phonetic. If you don't know how a word is pronounced, you never will until someone tells you (or you read a phonetic representation done through one or another alphabets that have been created to guide you through Chinese pronunciation). It's anathema to say, but the Vietnamese did something very good for literacy when the eliminated characters in favor of roman letters. </p>

<p>Of my friends who have LIVED in China for more than 10 years, there is exactly one who speaks Chinese such that if you weren't looking at him you could suppose he is Chinese. And these guys are not slouches. Two years in Brazil and I guarantee you I would be at least at the level of a high school student if not a college student, and my accent would be disappearing (I have lived in other places where I've picked up other languages).</p>

<p>So don't think you can quite easily just throw Chinese in your arsenal. If you aren't willing to spend at least two years there, don't even begin.</p>

<p>Have I done enough to dissuade you?</p>

<p>The other thing: if you are in the running for a job that involves speaking Chinese, chances are there will be native Chinese speakers applying as well. Good luck, if that is an important factor in hiring.</p>

<p>So, if that hasn't put too much cold water on you, then you have the proper expectations and toughness to learn the language....</p>

<p>Actually, further to Mr. Payne's comment. There was a comparitive study done of elementary school children Spain vs. China. The Spanish kids learned a lot more of their own language in the same amount of time. It's more laborious for EVERYONE.</p>

<p>And it's key to note that the laboriousness is not really equated to grammatical complexities like switching tenses (this is much more the domain of Japanese, which is actually in the long run the harder language according to friends of mine who have actually mastered to some extent both). The complexities of Chinese are largely related to rote, in a sense boring, learning and recognizing shorthand allusions (proverbs) to Chinese history or other cultural elements that appear as vocabulary words often. In other words, it's all about memorization.</p>

<p>The proverbial studiousness of Chinese begins with their own language.</p>

<p>On a personal note: I had a Chinese history professor at SAIS who (I thought at least) loved me. I wanted her to write a rec. so I could go on and study for a PhD in Chinese history. Her reply was "absolutely don't do it." At first I was kind of hurt, but she later explained: Look, it'll take you 4-5 years just to get the languages you need (classical Chinese and Japanese and two European languages, which I already had by the way, in addition to your knowledge of Mandarin). If you were dissuaded by my dissuasion, you won't have close to the stamina to complete that PhD. It's the same with the language.</p>

<p>God, I'm verbose tonight....</p>

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<p>Incredulous, that was a great post.</p>

<p>My wife is a Mandarin speaker and I have tried to learn the basics. I realized that, without living in a Mandaring speaking country, I can only become so proficient. </p>

<p>Really solid advice</p>

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<p>You guys are great, and a special thanks to Incredulous- I think I speak for everyone when I say please be as verbose as you wish.
OK, so now I'm having doubts about taking Chinese. However, I do have to take a language during my two years at SAIS (woohoo!), and I just don't think it's worth it to take Portuguese if an intensive summer course and some self-study will be suffice for me to reach a conversational level- since I'm already into Brazilian samba and bossa nova, I don't think I'll ever lack motivation in the latter and will probably get better without even knowing it=)
I guess I feel like I'd rather take advantage of the SAIS instructors in learning a language that might not be so easy on my own, or that I might not be so motivated to study in my own time, but nevertheless helpful professionally.
OK, so I understand that I will only be conversational in Mandarin at best after two years. However, given my interest in Latin America, I think that's all I'll really need when the appropriate circumstances arise- I don't think I'll ever have the need to research heavy material in Chinese, for example- you're right, there will always be native-speakers for that- but more to "break the ice" when dealing with Chinese colleagues, officials, investors, etc.- which I discovered as a Peace Corps volunteer struggling with an indigenous language, is worth more than it seems.
And as for the other Romance languages, I don't see how French or Italian would really help me out in the region, at least not more than the language of THE indisputable emerging power in the region.
Also, I'm Asian-American, speak, read, and write Japanese, so perhaps that'll help somewhat?</p>

<p>Thanks.</p>

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<p>Having learned French, German, and some Latin, I am actually all about learning what I consider to be the most useful languages: English, Chinese, Spanish I consider the big 3. Arabic and maybe Russian might be others. Beyond that, choose. You've already got a great one in Japanese. </p>

<p>The others are curiosities, which is fine if that's what you want, but the fact is most people can only have so many languages in working memory anyway, so why clutter your brain with French or Italian (unless you really love the cultures, which is a great end in and of itself)? I took French in high school, and I largely think it was a waste of time (esp. as compared to Spanish which matters here). Then again, I tend to view language learning without immersion at some point as pointless. To this day, I can understand French, but I can't speak it because I never was there for any significant amount of time. </p>

<p>I would only learn Italian to talk to the ladies, but it's too late for that for me, and that's what my Portuguese is now for. Tongue only partly in cheek.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Also, I'm Asian-American, speak, read, and write Japanese, so perhaps that'll help somewhat?

[/quote]
This will be an immense help and actually changes the picture significantly. If you can read and write all the major Kanji, you are much further down the road. The only thing I would suggest for you now short of going to China is to buy Rosetta Stone Chinese (you can return them within 6 months for full refund). And start immediately building the neural pathways to learn the tones. You will be in really good shape when you start learning Chinese more formally. For SAIS, you don't have to take a language after you've passed out of one. You could test out of Spanish, and if you wanted or needed the credential Japanese. So you could do Chinese for as long as you wanted. And then finish off with Portuguese if you just wanted to get that out of the way. I passed out of Chinese after a semester, then took advanced German for a semester and then beginning Spanish. My thought was: I am paying for this, so why shouldn't I? I think SAIS began to actively discourage people from doing this, but what're they gonna do? My Spanish teacher there made me do a quid pro quo with her: "If you promise not to take any more classes from me ever again," she boomed in her heavy Castilian accent, "I will promise to give you a grade that doesn't damage your record too much." I never did homework, 'cause I was just taking the class for the exposure and grades don't really count in language. And my teacher hated me because of it. (But actually, I studied for the final and did well on it.) </p>

<p>Have fun. And congratulations on getting into SAIS. If you are like me, you will have the time of your life. I was glad to finish it when I did, but I could easily go back now and double up for another Master's. </p>

<p>What are you going to study again?</p>

<p>
[quote]
However, given my interest in Latin America, I think that's all I'll really need when the appropriate circumstances arise- I don't think I'll ever have the need to research heavy material in Chinese, for example- you're right, there will always be native-speakers for that- but more to "break the ice" when dealing with Chinese colleagues, officials, investors, etc.- which I discovered as a Peace Corps volunteer struggling with an indigenous language, is worth more than it seems.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Forewarned is forearmed. As long as you don't expect to be anywhere close to where you'd be in a Romance language at the end, go for it.</p>

<p>And the other thing, you didn't tell me you can read and write Japanese. That will make a big difference. Find a book I think it's called Read and Write Chinese. It breaks I think it's the 2,700 most important traditional (not simplified) characters into their groupings according to radicals. If you know Japanese, you can learn a lot of these. These are the characters that occur in something like 97% of the words in newspapers. When you go to SAIS, you will learn simplified. But because you know Kanji, I would work with that as a base. It's much easier to go from traditional to simplified than in reverse.</p>