<p>hi everyone, I just have a general question about studying/majoring/minoring/getting a certificate in any Ivy league/top schools. Is it possible to do so without having any prior knowledge of the language? For example, can i just major in Greek in 4 years if I have never taken any Greek course? (btw Greek is just a random example)</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>Definitely, at least at Princeton (and this IS the Princeton forum…). Of course if you start before college you’ll have a head start, but plenty of people start from scratch.</p>
<p>I looked at the departmental requirements for all departments with a required foreign language component, and it looks like the only language where this might get tricky is Portuguese (because for some reason the only intro Portuguese classes we have are designed for those with 3 semesters’ worth of a romance language); starting from scratch would require starting with intro French or Italian freshman fall, intensive French/Italian (a double class) freshman Spring, and intensive intro Portuguese sophomore fall. Any other language should be significantly more manageable, though.</p>
<p>^ Um, about 99% of the people who study Portuguese in this country come to it from Spanish. The two languages have very similar grammar and syntax, and a ton of cognates. They sound very different, though. (I am fluent in Spanish. I have little or no trouble reading a newspaper in Portuguese, but I can barely understand anything if people are talking.) You could take French or Italian, of course, but my guess is that the three semesters of a Romance language most people have when they start Portuguese are three semesters of Spanish.</p>
<p>That most people who take Portuguese have significant experience in Spanish is completely true; however, regarding the requirements for entrance to the Spanish and Portuguese department through the Portuguese track (at least one 200-level POR class before the end of sophomore year), one who showed up at Princeton without sufficient knowledge of Spanish to place into at least SPA 103 but was dead set on majoring in Portuguese (I doubt this has ever happened) would not be able to take enough Spanish early enough to get to 200-level POR before junior year since the prereq for POR 110 is completion of the 107 class in Spanish, French, or Italian. French and Italian are different from Spanish because they offer a class that covers 102 and 107 in the same semester. This would allow one to take POR 110 as a first-semester sophomore and 200-level POR sophomore spring.</p>