<p>How good do you have to be at learning languages to be a Classics major?</p>
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<p>At many schools there are two different tracks you can take as a Classics major. One emphasizes the language(s) and the other is usually called something like Classical Civilization. The latter involves taking more history, art history, philosophy, etc. courses that focus on the ancient world, and relatively fewer language courses. But you will still need to take some Latin and/or Ancient Greek. If you're not good at learning languages at all, it might not make much sense to major in Classics.</p>
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<p>It depends. Many colleges have two tracks/majors- a classical languages track and a classical civilization track. The classical civilization track usually don't require much, if any, ancient languages. The classical languages track would typically involve 4 years of Greek or Latin and three years of the other. </p>
<p>Personally, I really like languages, so I'm adding as many as I can. I've taken Greek and Latin, added Egyptian this year, and will be taking Akkadian or Ugaritic next year. On the other hand, some of my friends are only interested in the archaeology or philosophy aspects and haven't taken any language courses at all. It's up to you.</p>
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<p>Ah, I see. I think I'd be more interested in the classical civilization track. Thanks for the advice.</p>
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<p>One important thing to note, though - if you want to do graduate work in any area of classics/classical civilization, you need to know Latin and Greek, period. Many grad schools ask for reading fluency in French, German, and/or Italian as well, since many important resources are written in those languages.</p>
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<p>But the great thing about classical languages is that you don't have any native speakers to notice your American accent (said tokenadult, the modern language major who also took several classical languages in college).</p>
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<p>^^Yeah, if you want to start an unresolvable argument, ask questions about the proper pronunciation of various words in Latin. There are no native speakers around to settle the question.</p>
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