<p>I'm thinking of working for international organization, so I did some research and found that, in UN, there're many requires for French because the working languages(not the six language thinggy) are Eng and French(at least in the New York headquarter). And I've heard that France has good academic reputation in comparative law and international law. But, I'm Asian(living in Thailand and go to US for college and hopefully to law school), so should I study Chinese coz they maybe expect me to be fluent in this main Asian language? Also, I'm interested in Chinese cultures more than French(c'mon, it's so much cooler with its letter looking like a picture and its ancient philosophy) and maybe China is a bigger market in the future, but if French is better for my career, I can be in love with French too coz I love their food and accent.
So what do you say, French or Chinese?</p>
<p>i would do chinese. if you learn chinese in undergrad, then you would have a much easier time learning french than the other way around. you should definitely learn chinese in a classroom setting, but french you can just go there after a year and its really not that hard. at least start out with chinese. i dont know what year you are, but if you start taking chinese like freshmen year and study abroad over a summer, by the beginning of junior year you should be decent. (college languages are much more effective than high school ones, and a summer there is basically a year in a classroom.) keep taking chinese but also just take intro french or something, get a year in, maybe two so you are not a complete noob when you find yourself in france.</p>
<p>a lot of people say taking two at once is confusing. well, that might true if you start them both at the same time. the trick is to have one upper level and one beginning level. ive done that and it is not difficult at all.</p>
<p>i don't think people will "expect" you to know chinese just because you're from asia. </p>
<p>if you're interested in international law to do business/corporate law, i'd go with chinese, spanish, arabic, japanese, or (perhaps) korean or german. </p>
<p>if you're interested in more human-rights stuff, spanish and french and arabic might be good, along with various indigenous languages.</p>
<p>I would say French is a great language. The second official language at the UN (after English) is French.</p>
<p>I'm interested in international law as well. I'm bilingual, plus I studied a third language as a minor in college. Would there be enough time to study another language (or possibly polish the one I minored in) during law school? I know that'd be impossible during first year, but how about the 2nd and 3rd years?</p>
<p>which languages have you studied? so you want to possibly study a fourth language? while that is impressive just by the number, i doubt you will get much use out of another. diminishing returns is definitely at work. very few people use 4 languages. you would prob do better by actually trying to be a better lawyer. </p>
<p>if you want to study a language for fun or interest though, no clue.</p>
<p>Don't learn French, its useless and only spoken by crappy countries.</p>
<p>Spanish (ten characters)</p>
<p>ON a more constructive note, I wouldn't bother learning a language while in law school. You will be very focused on doing well, getting on a good law journal, and finding the right summer internships and jobs which will land you your dream job after law school. I think learning a language will take too much time from that ultimate goal.</p>
<p>"The second official language at the UN (after English) is French."</p>
<p>Sigh. French is the official diplomatic language -- Eglish just came to replace it, unofficially, with the expansion of US interest and intervention (globalization) all over the world. </p>
<p>If you don't mind learning a new alphabet go for an asian, or a middle-eastern language.</p>
<p>
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Sigh. French is the official diplomatic language -- Eglish just came to replace it, unofficially, with the expansion of US interest and intervention (globalization) all over the world.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>In fairness, it should be pointed out that the spread of English as a world language was more a product of the British Empire than it was the influence of the US. It was the Brits who made English the lingua franca in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Africa, Australia, Malaysia, Nigeria, Canada, and many other countries. The US had nothing to do with it.</p>
<p>Very true...but, the US surely perpetuated it.:)</p>
<p>Chinese & Japanese have rapidly expanding law industries. In fact, U of I is thinking about building a law school campus (U of I in China or something, odd I know) in China somewhere. Legitimately are making deals right now and finding a space. China is slowly privatizing and law is becoming more important. Japanese used to think that lawyers were not that important. Now they are changing and gaining ground in the amount of lawyers per capita. This is what my law prof tells me. Those reasons are paraphrased so they may not technically be exactly correct but I was just explaining my reasoning.</p>
<p>I did not know that about China and Japan (well I did suspect China would have a growing legal market, but not Japan). Incidentally, I minored in Japanese in college...maybe I'll just brush up on it during the next year while I apply to law schools. Japanese-English translation used to be a hobby of mine, but I've forgotten a lot of Japanese in the 3 years since I graduated from college. :(</p>
<p>wow there're a lot of posts here! Thanks, you guys.</p>
<p>
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Japanese used to think that lawyers were not that important. Now they are changing and gaining ground in the amount of lawyers per capita.
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<p>Wrong wrong wrong. Sorry, but wrong.</p>
<p>The Japanese had low numbers of attorneys per capita because the ruling party (the LDP) passed very stringent regulations on bar passage rates (around 1%). </p>
<p>The Japanese are in fact middle-of-the-road in terms of litigiousness. However, if you look at the pre-war era, the Japanese were actually one of the most litigious societies in the world. Post-war, not so much. This is for systemic reasons. Instead of using attorneys' services, Japanese are more likely to enter into arbitration agreements (since they are cheap and easy.) </p>
<p>The LDP, by the way, made bar passage rates low deliberately to lower litigiousness. This is also partly why they made sure to do away with class action lawsuits.</p>
<p>But it has nothing to do with interest in the field. Plenty of Japanese would love to be attorneys. It's just too risky to study law when so few will be able to actually matriculate into the field itself.</p>
<p>The UN has six official languages everything must be printed in: English, Chinese, French, Russian, Spanish and Arabic. This is because of the P5 (Great Britain, United States, France, Russia, China) and Spanish is spoken by a great deal of people, as is Arabic.</p>
<p>Nobody speaks French, its a stupid language spoken by some vain, wannabe power with delusions of grandeur.</p>
<p>It's the only language that should not be on the list, followed substantially behind by Russian.</p>
<p>I wouldn't count out the Russians quite yet. Don't forget that they still control the second largest arsenal of nukes, and many of former Soviet satellites use Russian to some degree.</p>
<p>Dah. . . . .</p>