<p>I'm interested in learning Japanese, Chinese, and perhaps other languages. What sort of classes are there? Do they employ native speakers?</p>
<p>I took Arabic @ UT and speak it fluently now. It was a big part of helping me land a job in Dubai (even though most of the business is conducted in English there). </p>
<p>UT is one of the top Arabic programs in the country. In association with University of Michigan, Texas wrote one of the main books for learning Arabic. The only other program that I can safely say rivals UT is Middleburry (and Middleburry forces you to sign a contract saying that you won’t speak another language other than Arabic for an entire summer). </p>
<p>However there have been some changes with a few of the professors over the past 10 years and I’m not sure how effective they are now. But I am sure the extremely tough curriculum has not changed. It was very time consuming (5 hours per semester) but you can say that you have a firm grasp of the language after one year at UT. It was so good, infact, that I did a study abroad at a Jordanian university and they put me and another UT student up to 3rd year Arabic after only completing two semesters.</p>
<p>How big is the homework load? Considering I’m entering cockrell, perhaps taking more than one language is a suicide XD</p>
<p>On a related note, what are the language classes like in terms of classwork/curriculum, and what types of homework are assigned? I’ve been taking Mandarin for four years in high school, and I plan to continue at UT.</p>
<p>@soad: Same here quake! Where are you from?</p>
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I wonder too about how the classes are conducted. Do we get to speak Chinese, besides reading and writing? Considering it’s 5 semester hours, what sort of work do you do in class, and out of class?</p>
<p>Don’t take Arabic unless you really want to learn the language. It is very time consuming. I would say that I spent at least 2 and a half hours a day doing homework for that class. We had to read entire lessons out loud on to an audio tape recorder for homework and turn the tapes in to our TA for analysis. There was also a mandatory computer lab session that we had to attend. The professor actually evaluated people up front to see whether they had the gusto to hack the class. She even cut a few kids and made them drop the class. It was called Arabic boot camp back then.</p>
<p>I was in the COLA and Arabic wasn’t my major, however, you had to have two years of a language to satisfy your degree requirement. I decided to do a study abroad one summer to finish off year two because Arabic was taking up too much of my time. If you’re doing something intensive like engineering, I wouldn’t recommend taking Arabic. Unless, ofcourse, if you are doing petroleum engineering. And then Arabic will likely help you get a job with one of the big oil companies.</p>
<p>thanks for the info. Does anyone here have any experiences about chinese or japanese classes?</p>
<p>I’m from Portland, Oregon. You?</p>
<p>Jakarta. Guess my nationality ;p</p>
<p>I don’t have personal experience with chinese or japanese, but one of my friends is in chinese and watching him learn it is like watching someone get a root canal: they know they need it, but they’re suffering through the entire ordeal…on the other hand, japanese is supposed to be really easy from what I’ve heard, but if you’re gonna be in engineering, i wouldn’t take arabic or chinese, they’re just insanely hard along with an insanely hard school like cockrell… you really don’t want to off yourself do you?</p>
<p>how are the spanish classes at ut</p>
<p>seems fun. hell, that is. i still need chinese all the same unfortunately… luckily i have good basics</p>
<p>This is what I read from UT website
<a href=“Asian Studies | Liberal Arts | UT - Austin”>Asian Studies | Liberal Arts | UT - Austin;
<p>“Heritage Speakers” of Chinese (students who speak proficiently but cannot read or write) are required to take the accelerated CHI 604/612 track. The Chinese language instructors recommend that heritage speakers begin with 604, even if they have tested into 612.</p>
<p>I heard CHI 604/612 is very demanding and you need to spend at least 2 hours a day to study. I am willing to spend that much time study it but I can only speak some basic Chinese and would like to take the regular CHI 506/507. There is only one session still open. All others are waitlisted.</p>
<p>I know, I saw that. I wanted to take Chinese as well. 
We just have to hope they open up during the Fall sign up.</p>
<p>you need to spend at least 2 hours a day to study? Errr…</p>
<p>Spanish classes are now 6 credit hours thanks to budget issues and foreign language professors who psuhed the issue because they didn’t want to see the foreign languages become optional for liberal arts students.</p>
<p>Does anyone know about the rigorousness of Korean at UT?</p>
<p>Waitlisted already? For fall 2010? </p>
<p>I’m going to be a freshman and I was goin to do
the 604. I need that!</p>
<p>@Chinexican: If you are talking about classes being closed for registration, they are likely holding some spaces for Freshman orientation session registration. Each session will have slots available, I assume. I am hoping that there will be some availability for Fall Registration, though I am sure it won’t be wonderful.</p>