Learning Chinese in Berkeley

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of California - Berkeley
1

<p>Given its rising influence and an interest in its history and political economy, I'm interested in gaining some level of of fluency with the (Mandarin) Chinese language. </p>

<p>However, there are several issues:</p>

<p>1) I'm a political economy major and my concentration is Russia / Eurasia, so there'll be no priority waitlisting. I've heard the East Asian languages programs have been severely curtailed for non-majors due to the budget cuts.</p>

<p>2) I'm a bit concerned that the work will overwhelm me, and that I'd get low grades which will hit the GPA. Presumably some people doing this would be ethnic Chinese with parents who know the language, giving them a substantial advantage, plus the c.20 units needed to achieve some kind of fluency will cut into other classes I'd like to take. So I'm looking for some kind of program without grading, but nonetheless serious at teaching the language well (and preferably an acknowledgement of competency or fluency at the end if completed successfully). Perhaps there's something <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/21/education/21chinese.html"&gt;the Chinese government is funding</a> in Berkeley?</p>

<p>Would anyone know of anything I've described?
Thanks.</p>

2

<p>I know several of my engineering friends (who are not Chinese majors) who are in Chinese 1A/1B and 7A/7B and can already write sentences and speak. They know they’re spending a lot of time on it only to get decently so-so grades, but they do it b/c they want to learn and they love to learn.
Btw, you won’t see Chinese who’s fluent at Chinese taking Chinese just to boost their gpa, trust me; there are other courses you can put much less effort.
I really like your attitude that you are considering to take classes that will prepare you well for the changing world and i think you should just do it.</p>

3

<p>Fluent Chinese speakers take the X courses, as in 1AX, 1BX, rather than the 1A, 1B courses.</p>

<p>At least, that’s what’s supposed to happen.</p>

4

<p>You could just take it P/NP.</p>

5

<p>I took Chinese 1A last semester and I don’t know anyone in my class that was trying to major in Chinese
A lot of people were Econ/MCB majors
And they give out pretty good grades and if you put in the effort I don’t see why you would get a bad grade but if things don’t go well you can change to P/NP
Oh and I think there is a decal this semester about learning taiwanese [DeCal</a> : Taiwanese Language DeCal](<a href=“My Dating Tests – What I learned to avoid”>My Dating Tests – What I learned to avoid) check this out!</p>

6

<p>I’ve learned it by osmosis just by walking around campus so much. :D</p>

7

<p>Thanks for the info.
What’s this Summer course like? Does it cover the 1a material?</p>

<p>

</p>

8

<p>Yeah according to the catalog its equivalent to 1a-1b.
I might take it though it does seem pretty hardcore (3 hrs every day wot!)</p>

9

<p>The Taiwanese Decal teaches Taiwanese… That is like some aboriginal language that is a mix of Southern Chinese Dialect, Japanese, and aboriginal.</p>