<p>I want to study Sumerian Lit, which obviously is not offered in any form in my undergraduate program. Due to finance issues I cannot transfer out of my college, so I need to decide what to major in, keeping in mind my dream of being a Sumerologist. </p>
<p>My major options at this school are:
1. History- the program here has a modern focus, which doesn't interest me.
2. Anthropology, which has classes about everywhere on the earth except Mesopotamia (I don't understand either)
3. Classical Studies, which I am learning to love for it's own sake, but is of course only Greek and Roman. </p>
<p>I am leaning towards Classics because of it's literary component. Will knowing Classical Greek and having experience studying other (less) ancient civilizations help me when applying to a grad school program for Sumerian studies? </p>
<p>Also, am I to assume that as either a Classicist or a Sumerologist, I should have a basic knowledge of German and French (for scholarly articles)?</p>
<p>Any advice from anyone in any field would be much appreciated!</p>
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<p>Classics would be your best option.</p>
<p>Yes, a reading of French and German is important. It might give you an edge in applying to graduate programs.</p>
<p>Biblical Hebrew might be a good language to study, even if there’s no major offered. It would be a good combination with Ancient Greek.
Are no Biblical Hebrew courses offered at your school? if there is no Near Eastern Studies dept. at your school, is it offered in a religious studies or Jewish Studies program? If it’s not offered as a formal course, can you take an independent study tutorial with a professor who might know it (from the Classics dept. or Religion dept.? Is there another school nearby where you can cross-register? What about online courses? [Learn</a> Biblical Hebrew with eTeacher and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem](<a href=“http://eteacherbiblical.com/]Learn”>http://eteacherbiblical.com/)
<a href=“http://www.calvinseminary.edu/onlineCourses/hebrew101.php[/url]”>http://www.calvinseminary.edu/onlineCourses/hebrew101.php</a> [Classical</a> Hebrew Review – Learn Biblical Hebrew Online](<a href=“http://www.learn-hebrew-bible.com/classical-hebrew-review]Classical”>http://www.learn-hebrew-bible.com/classical-hebrew-review)
Or, can you do a study abroad program at a university in Israel?</p>
<p>If you do a Classics major, will you only concentrate on Greek? I think it will give you more options if you do both Latin and Greek, though you can still choose to emphasis Greek.</p>
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<p>First of all, it is awesome that you’re considering pursuing Sumerology! We need more people out there, in any case.</p>
<p>To add onto what zapfino has said - yes, please do check to see if your school has a Near Eastern department of some sort, and if possible, consider picking up Biblical Hebrew* - you might want to look into doubling up in Classics and Linguistics, or majoring in one (probably Classics) and minoring in the other (Linguistics). French and German are most definitely required, and you’ll want to have reading fluency in both. Additionally, try volunteering at museums, either during the school year (if you have a museum on-campus or close by to your college) or over the summer (many museum offer internship programs at this time, so you can check some of those out as well). If you’re interested in the archaeology side of things, don’t forget to shove in some field experience. If you aren’t, that’s fine, but I do advise you to still take a few archaeology courses; they can only help you, given how interdisciplinary the field is.</p>
<p>While knowing Latin and Greek won’t be helpful in and of itself, the rigorous language training you’ll be given will be very useful for future language preparation.</p>
<p>If you have anymore questions, feel free to PM me. I’m an aspiring Assyriologist, so we’re pretty much working to go into the same general branch. :)</p>
<p>*I know others might disagree with me, but I’d make an argument saying that it might be beneficial to pick up any Semitic language, even if it’s not directly used in the field. As a Sumerologist, you’ll be expected to know Akkadian like the back of your own hand (in fact, many Sumerologists know Akkadian better than they know Sumerian), and having a Semitic background will make it that much easier to learn it. Which isn’t to say that it’s impossible to learn Akkadian without any background - speaking from personal experience, it’s very possible - but it’s a difficult language, and if you can lighten a bit of your load by having a system already in place for learning Semitic languages, then you’ll be pretty much set.</p>
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<p>That’s so ****ing cool.</p>
<p>neltharion, you have said
</p>
<p>Does that means Germany (and France) makes excellent academic researches on Assyriology? And do you think German Universities are good places for students to do their undergraduate studies on Ancient Middle East?</p>
<p>Thank you!</p>
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<p>Unfortunately, I’m not all that familiar with German universities to be able to say much about them. It’ll certainly help that you’ll have German and English under your belt, and French is easy enough to self-study, IMHO. Additionally - if you’re choosing between France and Germany, that is - keep in mind that German is by far the more important of the two languages. If you’re going into Assyriology, you’ll be using a number of German grammar books, sign lists, and dictionaries, and I’ll just say it right now: If you don’t know German, it is extremely frustrating. French is, on the other hand, of limited usefulness at the undergrad level, in my experience.</p>
<p>I’m looking through the faculty page at my university right now, and one of my (quite renowned) professors attended University of Munich and University of Tübingen. While there, he apparently studied Assyriology, Egyptology, archaeology, Hittitology, and Indo-European and Semitic linguistics, which is … nuts. All this to say that you can certainly do a good deal of really great work in Germany for any of these subjects.</p>
<p>Additionally, if you’re looking further abroad, you can consider University of Amsterdam and Leiden University. Two of the Hittitologists here received their PhDs at Amsterdam, and if I’m not mistaken Leiden does quite good work in Hittite. (Though my info may be dated, so you might want to check on that.)</p>
<p>Sorry I’m not more help. I’m more acquainted with the ANE programs here in the USA, so I can’t really speak authoritatively on any schools beyond the border; all I can do is sort of point you towards schools my professors have attended in the past, which in any case probably speaks more about the grad programs at those universities than the undergrad programs.</p>
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<p>Thank you very much! I think your reply is really helpful!</p>
<p>As far as I know, students can study Ancient Middle East at bachelor level in several German universities, which require them to start learning those ancient oriental languages since the first semester. And that sounds somewhat crazy…</p>
<p>By the way, as you study Assyriology in the US, do you think reading knowledge is enough concerning German language skills? And is adequate competence of speaking and writing in German a waste (have nothing to do with academic study)?</p>
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<p>I’d say reading knowledge is probably enough; as long as you can translate from German to English, and unless you’re planning on publishing articles written in German, I would take the more efficient German-for-reading course instead of a comprehensive reading-speaking-writing class. The latter is typically slower paced and doesn’t quite prepare you for reading research articles written in German, which the former does. Eventually, you’ll probably end up learning the language; many of my professors seem to be decently fluent in the language - at least insofar as I can tell - so I wouldn’t necessarily call it “a waste” … Not to mention, if you’re corresponding with someone who exclusively speaks/writes German (which, granted, is rare since they’d be required to learn English), then yes, it’d be helpful it know the language.</p>
<p>Basically, reading fluency is most important, and it’s easier and more time-efficient to gain reading fluency than it is to learn how to speak, read, and write German.</p>
<p>I’ve only taken Akkadian so far (and will be doubling up next year with either Akkadian + Hittite/Sumerian), but the one thing I advise you to do is not to take Akkadian and Sumerian at the same time if at all possible. I’m only considering it because of necessity. Otherwise I wouldn’t be going for it. Hittite + Akkadian/Sumerian is more manageable, from what I’ve heard, but if you’re going for Sumerology or Assyriology, you can get by very well with only taking Sumerian and Akkadian at the undergrad level. Hittite would be an extra plus. (And honestly, any of these languages is a plus; many ANE PhD students don’t have this type of preparation when they first apply since there aren’t many colleges that offer these languages in the first place.)</p>
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<p>
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<p>Do you mean they are decently fluent in speaking and writing in German? Perhaps they attend conferences in Germany sometimes or write some publications in German?</p>
<p>I’ve found the webpage of the professor you’ve mentioned. I’m quite surprised that although he has been working in the US for about thirty years, nearly half of his recent publications are written in German…</p>
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