<p>English is the general international business language. Stop in at any meeting of lawyers from different countries (or for that matter, any international meeting in most any profession) and you will find that all or nearly all those attending can speak English, and do so, except when exclusively with colleagues from their own country. </p>
<p>However, to make others feel more comfortable, and to incrase your knowledge of what is going on around you, it always helps to speak their language to some degree. Language can be learned at any time that you have the time to do so; it's not unusual for someone to learn a language for business purposes while employed.</p>
<p>So my advice to you is - if you are interested in working in an international organization that functions in a certain country or a certain part of the world, when you can make time available, learn at least the primary language of that area as spoken by the professional/business class or as spoken by the majority of the people.</p>
<p>but I do wish I had spent fewer nights in Shinjuku at bars and more of them studying my kanji...</p>
<p>Tsk, Tsk, UCLAri! I expected better of you (shakes head in dismay) ;)</p>
<p>Rice paddys? I did not believe that rice had an odor. Must be that Jap rice that smells.</p>
<p>"I took an 8 unit intenseive summer course at ICU in Tokyo, and I sorta got a B."</p>
<pre><code> Must be them smart Japanese kids who made that killer curve. Of course, American students and schools are far superior to those Japanese schools. ;) I am joking, I'm joking, just a little bit of jest!
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Rice paddys? I did not believe that rice had an odor. Must be that Jap rice that smells.
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<p>Actually, rice produces tons of methane...</p>
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Must be them smart Japanese kids who made that killer curve. Of course, American students and schools are far superior to those Japanese schools. I am joking, I'm joking, just a little bit of jest!
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<p>Oh, no. This was a Japanese language course. So there weren't any Japanese in there, just a couple of Japanese-Americans. But I'll tell you what, the Americans who could take regular Japanese science classes more than held their own with the Japanese students. Granted, that was partly because college in Japan is a joke.</p>
<p>Heh, sorry about the Hiragana...for some reason my web browser wouldn't let me convert to Kanji when I pressed the space bar. Actually, Kanji conversion only works in Microsoft Word on my computer. So what are you doing living next to rice paddies in a small village? Teaching English with a program like JET? Must be quite an experience! There's something to be said for the idyllic East Asian farm life...</p>
<p>One more comment on English being the international language of business: I used to work for an American subsidiary of one of the latest French corporations. The official corporate language of the French parent company was English.</p>
<p>Here's a quote from a Businessweek article on the the rising importance of the English language:</p>
<p>"English is firmly entrenched nearly everywhere as the international language of business, finance, and technology. But in Europe, it's spreading far beyond the elites. Indeed, English is becoming the binding agent of a continent, linking Finns to French and Portuguese as they move toward political and economic unification. A common language is crucial, says Tito Boeri, a business professor at Bocconi University in Milan, to take advantage of Europe's integrated labor market.'</p>
<p>"English, in short, is Europe's language. And while some adults are slow to embrace this, it's clear as day for European children. 'If I want to speak to a French person, I have to speak in English,' says Ivo Rowekamp, an 11-year-old in Heidelberg, Germany.</p>
<p>"The implications for business are enormous. It's no longer just top execs who need to speak English. Everyone in the corporate food chain is feeling the pressure to learn a common tongue as companies globalize and democratize. These days in formerly national companies such as Renault and BMW, managers, engineers, even leading blue-collar workers are constantly calling and e-mailing colleagues and customers in Europe, the U.S., and Japan. The language usually is English, an industrial tool now as basic as the screwdriver."</p>
<p>I'm signing up for Intensive Introductory Chinese this fall. I'm also going to try to keep my French and German in the process, unless I die first.</p>
<p>hey, here's the question. i'm chinese, should i take japanese? cuz it's easier for chinese to learn japanese, we can half read and half guess japanese, right? lol
that's so much talking going on around me about how useful japanese is in the business world, but i don't even want to touch japanese because somehow i think japanese is inferior than chinese (i know this is really offensive, but consider japanese came from chinese, I somehow feel not right to learn japanese. And I feel Chinese is more elegant. I know i'm weird, so don't attack me. )</p>
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hey, here's the question. i'm chinese, should i take japanese? cuz it's easier for chinese to learn japanese, we can half read and half guess japanese, right? lol
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<p>It's easier in certain ways and harder in others. Many of the Chinese-Americans in my class had no problem learning the kanji (hanzi), but had trouble with the grammar and conjugations just like everyone else. The Chinese (as in, the non-ABCs) on the other hand usually were very good at learning the written form, but their pronunciation oftentimes lacked a certain...preciseness.</p>
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that's so much talking going on around me about how useful japanese is in the business world, but i don't even want to touch japanese because somehow i think japanese is inferior than chinese (i know this is really offensive, but consider japanese came from chinese, I somehow feel not right to learn japanese. And I feel Chinese is more elegant. I know i'm weird, so don't attack me. )
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<p>Well, I'm glad to report that you're not all that offensive, but obviously naive (or maybe ignorant.) Japanese did not "come from Chinese." Many words, as well as kanji, were borrowed from Chinese, but at its root Japanese is most likely a combination Altaic and Austronesian language formed by the mingling of peoples during the Ice Age. </p>
<p>You know, if you don't "feel right" learning Japanese, why learn English when you can learn Latin and French and German instead? Silly is silly, athena_epoch.</p>
<p>Really? I always thought they are mongolian-origin coming from some horse-riding tribes in mainland Asia, not in Ice Age but in 4th century (they don't have such a long history).
And they only "borrowed " kenji? Excuse me, their whole writing lanuage system was developed from Chinese, and you call that "borrow"? It's called "rooted from", otherwise their writing system wouldn't even exist, cuz they had no writing system of their own at all.</p>
<p>I am actually taking Latin and French, and I'm planning to take spanish & German in university, I feel it's necessary to learn the roots of English, thanks for making my point. btw, how can you compare Japnese with english? Japanese is just a minor language. it doesn't have the status of lots of other languages. </p>
<p>Silly I may be, but silly you too Mr.know-all.</p>
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Really? I always thought they are mongolian-origin coming from some horse-riding tribes in mainland Asia, not in Ice Age but in 4th century (they don't have such a long history).
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And they only "borrowed " kenji? Excuse me, their whole writing lanuage system was developed from Chinese, and you call that "borrow"? It's called "rooted from", otherwise their writing system wouldn't even exist, cuz they had no writing system of their own at all.
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<p>Yes, the Japanese lacked a writing system. However, most linguists call it "borrowing." Call it whatever you want, but the Japanese SPOKEN language is not Chinese in origin. They also have their own written language that developed after the integration of kanji. </p>
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I am actually taking Latin and French, and I'm planning to take spanish & German in university, I feel it's necessary to learn the roots of English, thanks for making my point.
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<p>You don't need to study German and Latin and French to speak English effectively. That's the point. Nor is English any less "worthwhile" of a language because it, like Japanese, is somewhat of a creole language. Few languages today are monolithic in nature anyway. </p>
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btw, how can you compare Japnese with english? Japanese is just a minor language. it doesn't have the status of lots of other languages.
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<p>Japanese and English are both prone to taking from other languages when they need a word or concept. That's the reason for comparing the two.</p>
<p>Japanese is a member of the "Japonic" language family (which also contains Ryukyuan languages spoken on the islands of Ryukyu--these islands are part of Japan, but the local language is unintelligible for Japanese speakers). It's difficult to say for sure how Japanese relates to other languages in the region: Some theories say it descended from ancient Korean dialects, others say it came from Altaic languages (I was taught that it was part of the Ural-Altaic language family back in high school), and still others say it was influenced by Austronesian languages. Some theories suggest it is a creole language, combining more than one of these origins.</p>
<p>Although it is easier for Chinese to learn Japanese (especially reading/writing because of the kanji/hanzi equivalencies), learning spoken Japanese tends to be easier for Mongolians and Koreans (these languages have similar sentence structure/grammar). I think there's a sumo wrestling champion in Japan who's originally Mongolian...</p>
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I think there's a sumo wrestling champion in Japan who's originally Mongolian...
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<p>Well, that and Russian. Since Japanese themselves are no longer taking an interest in their own culture, it's paved the way for foreigners to get involved with things that used to be Japanese only.</p>
<p>Apparently, the next in line to be grand master of ninjitsu will probably be a non-Japanese as well.</p>
<p>French is far from dead. It is, along with English, spoken on every single continent. Not even Spanish has that. French and German still come in very handy if you want to be a lawyer, but alot of law firms are looking for people with specialties in other areas as most European lawyers speak english. Chinese both Cantonese and Mandarin will be good choices. Even Japanese is still good. Spanish to a lesser extent, but it is handy because the vast number of immigrants who speak it, but as a language to be using as an International Lawyer it isn't going to land you a job at a top firm. Portuguese, like Spanish, will be helpful as Brazil continues to modernize, but learning Spanish isn't going to make you stand out from the pack. Then again Chinese is one of the hardest languages for a native english speaker to learn aside from Hungarian. But, it is worth it, because it makes you valuable. It adds to your utility and makes a firm more willing to hire you if you have such talents.</p>
<p>French may not be "dead" but the reality is that no educated people in France are not fluent in English, and not a whole lot of firms in this country work in French-speaking Africa or Haiti. Again, just to try to drive this point home, you're not going to gain a sufficient level of fluency in any language you start learning now to make yourself any more useful to a firm.</p>