<p>Hey guys, i'm a freshman looking to major in computer science at berkeley starting this fall. i'm thinking about double majoring or getting a minor in a language.
i'm thinking about cs+japanese or chinese
which is more useful? i was born in china and i know how to read/speak fluently in chinese, just don't know how to write much.
should i strengthen my chinese or should i add another language to my repertoire?
should i double major? or should i just get a minor?
is it doable adding a language to cs major?</p>
<p>If you can read Chinese without any problems, you should be able to write with a word processor. </p>
<p>If you want to major in a language, it’d probably be more beneficial from a career point of view to choose Japanese.</p>
<p>I can type chinese on the computer, but i can only write a little bit on paper.
so i should major in japanese instead of just a minor?</p>
<p>You could teach yourself the characters to be able to write in Chinese (Mandarin?).</p>
<p>You may want to think about which culture you would rather deal with. You would probably be able to pass as Japanese and blend in there because you are Asian.</p>
<p>Majoring in an Asian language is quite intense. You have a great base in Chinese. With languages, you can list on a resume that you can speak a language without having majored in it.</p>
<p>Do you want to gain proficiency in the language, or do you want to take additional courses beyond that in literature, culture, etc.? A minor/major is not necessary for the former. Also, language departments can help with appropriate placement for heritage speakers of the language. In particular, Chinese language courses’ X and Y versions (e.g. 1X, 1Y, 10X, 10Y) are intended for heritage speakers of Mandarin (X) or other Chinese languages / dialects (Y).</p>
<p>I’m not really interested in taking classes about chinese culture/liiterature. I can pretty much teach myself how to write chinese again by practicing the words. But I’m just lazy and don’t want to spend time on that.
As for a career point of view. Will another language such as Japanese help me in the future?
As I’ve said before, I can fluently read/speak Chinese Mandarin and Cantonese.</p>
<p>about how many hours of work outside of class are required outside of class time for japanese lower division and CS61 series?</p>
<p>I also had a question on that…If someone wanted to learn the language but not specifically <em>major</em> in it, couldn’t they just take the language classes until they reached fluency or proficiency? That way they’d be able to go around all of the literature and culture courses.</p>
<p>And MDMom had a convincing argument/idea, about how you can just say you’re fluent in resumes, and not actually have to take the courses in college. It would also depend on what your major is, how many rigorous prereqs there are, and whether or not you have schedule space for a double major/language “electives”</p>
<p>As the old lady in Chinatown would say:
Wahhhh, yo mo gao cuo ahhhh!!!</p>
<p>lol berkinome they would kick you out of class so fast. And even if you do manage to get in, you would just stay quiet the whole time in fear knowing too much and getting caught. The rest of your classmates will think of you as a jerk for doing it just to get an easy A. Take a language you enjoy and actually have a passion for.</p>
<p>if i do chinese (which i don’t think i am), i will most likely take the upper division and skip the lower divisions. so what you just said does not apply to me because i dont want to waste my time in easy chinese classes.
i’m just debating whether is better to know a new language (japanese) or to gain proficiency in chinese</p>
<p>It’s definitely doable to add a language to a cs major. I would go with Japanese because it will be more useful for a cs major.</p>
<p>@goodmanthinking
why are you saying japanese is more useful for cs major?
and do you have experiences with the cs61 series and how many hours of work is necessary each day? (excluding the project)</p>
<p>On the resume issue and determining fluency…To me this is a difficult thing to measure. However, you can say that you have three years of college level language (if you took three years of language). I also think that if you are a native speaker, as the OP appears to be, there must be a way to indicate that.</p>
<p>My daughter was doing a dual major (not at Berkeley) in physics and Japanese with no high school work in that language. After three years of language classes, she has decided that she doesn’t want the major (at her university it is more than 50 credits for Japanese) and will instead get a certificate in East Asian studies.</p>
<p>To the OP, you might try a semester of Japanese and see what you think of it. You can always improve your Chinese skills because you have the foundation. </p>
<p>FWIW, it was difficult for my daughter to get the language and science classes she needed. Of her four semesters not including a summer session that was all Japanese language, she had scheduling conflicts three semesters and would have had another conflict this fall. The advantage at her school to taking the higher level language classes was that the courses did not have as many contact hours (hours in class and recitation). So check how many hours you are required to be in class for the languages. That might help you decide what you want to do.</p>
<p>You can preview CS 61A here:
[CS61A</a> Home Page](<a href=“http://www-inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/~cs61a/archives.html]CS61A”>CS61A Home Page)</p>
<p>And other CS courses here:
[EECS</a> Course WEB Sites](<a href=“http://www-inst.eecs.berkeley.edu/classes-eecs.html]EECS”>CAS - Central Authentication Service)</p>
<p>There is no reason you cannot take a course or two of advanced Chinese language, and some courses starting at beginner level in Japanese language, if you want to become more proficient in Chinese and learn Japanese. A minor or major is not necessary for those purposes.</p>
<p>@ucbalumnus
do you know which of the japanese classes are good for learning to speak/writer/read the language? but not so much about the literature/culture?</p>
<p>You know, the course catalog can tell you:</p>
<p>[General</a> Catalog - Japanese Courses](<a href=“http://sis.berkeley.edu/catalog/gcc_list_crse_req?p_dept_name=Japanese&p_dept_cd=JAPAN&p_path=l]General”>http://sis.berkeley.edu/catalog/gcc_list_crse_req?p_dept_name=Japanese&p_dept_cd=JAPAN&p_path=l)</p>
<p>For a beginner, Japanese language courses would be 1A, 1B, 10A, 10B, 100A, 100B, 102, 111 or 112 in that order.</p>
<p>thank you ucbalumnus. so 7a and 7b do not really teach you the language right? they teach you about the literature/culture?
and is there a way to take all 9 classes in 8 semesters since each is the prereq of the next one.</p>
<p>111 is not a prereq for 112. You can take those two simultaneously it looks like.</p>
<p>As was briefly mentioned earlier, keep in mind that language majors and minors do not simply teach you the language. They are humanities majors that encompass a variety of different topics, from language and culture to history and geography.</p>
<p>If you simply want to gain fluency in a language, just take Berkeley language courses on the side and study abroad, without pursuing the major or minor.</p>