<p>I never received a very strong background in foreign languages at my high school, which landed me in the unfortunate situation of not having any preference of which language to take next year.</p>
<p>Does anyone have any suggestions as to which languages may best suit my needs, i.e. are not too difficult to learn as a beginner at Dartmouth?</p>
<p>For people whose first language is English, it’s easiest to learn a language which uses the same alphabet. For that reason, I would advise against learning a language like Chinese, Japanese, Arabic or Russian.
Languages which are regarded as ‘easy’ to learn include Spanish and Indonesian. Other languages which are have similar levels of difficulty are Italian and French (in that order). German is difficult because although they use the same alphabet, the grammar and sentence structure is very different to what English speakers are used to.
I must confess, I know little about Dartmouth’s language programs so I can’t recommend one department over another, but I have studied French, German and Italian (I’ve also been to Spain). Study of French has helped me with Spanish and Italian and even German on some occaisions.
I guess it comes down to which language you feel most inclined to learn and how heavily your desire to learn it is. That is, I wouldn’t learn Indonesian simply because it’s ‘easy’. It might be more beneficial to learn Chinese if you have an interest in Chinese history and culture, even though the language learning will be more difficult.
As an aside, I am a French and Ancient History major. I wished I had taken Latin or Ancient Greek because it would be a real asset to my study of Ancient History. Unfortunately it’s too late for me but I would recommend learning a language that fits in with your other interests!
Hope that helps! Let us know which language you choose!
:)</p>
<p>Spanish is definitely one of the easiest languages for an English speaker to learn, especially Latin American as opposed to Castilian Spanish. The pronunciation of the latter is more difficult. I don’t know which is taught at D.</p>
<p>But which languages have you studied so far? Perhaps building on what you already know would help. Having a <em>reason</em> to study a particular language is also key. If you have an interest in any particular area of study, say art history, philosophy, or history of a certain period, that might guide your choice. (One piece of advice: if by some chance you are interested in classics, take Latin first. Ancient Greek is VERY difficult if you have no experience with an inflected language.)</p>
<p>Does anyone know the reputation of the teachers in the Spanish department?</p>
<p>One good thing about the Chinese department at D is grade inflation. Seriously. You really need to work hard at it, but as long as you work hard, you’ll make the grade.</p>
<p>German isn’t too bad until the 3rd year of HS-level… even then its not terrible</p>
<p>i’ve researched a bit on D’s website, but it’s still unclear whether if Classical languages–Greek/Latin–can be used to fulfill the foreign language requirement. anyone know about this? and is it even a good idea to begin Greek or Latin at this point?</p>
<p>Yes they can be used.</p>
<p>Does every level of every language have 7:45am drill four days per week?</p>
<p>No. Some languages stop after the first or second terms. And most usually have at least one drill section that meets later in the day. But virtually all have class meetings at 8.45am daily regardless, so you might as well bite the bullet.</p>
<p>Note that Latin doesn’t have any drill requirement at all.</p>