Linguistics major with only two years of language?

Applying to College
1

Hi,

So I want to major in speech language technologies emphasis of linguistics. My English grades are stellar and I’ve taken APs and honors consistently. I got a 5 on the AP Lang exam and a 35 and 33 respectively on the English and reading sections of the ACT. The thing is, I only took two years of language. Freshman year I took Spanish 2 and sophomore year I took Spanish 3. The levels have reached the third year, but my education remains at 2 years of language, which is required, but three years is recommended. Is it absurd for me to apply for a linguistics major when I’ve solely taken 2 years of language or should I do it? My top choice at the moment is UC Santa Barbara, which has the speech language technologies emphasis. Thanks for the opinions!

2

Three years is recommended for everyone, so in that sense it’s bad that you only have two years. However, linguistics isn’t particularly related to knowing foreign languages.

3

It’s the level reached that matters, not the actual number of courses. You took Spanish 3, therefore, you meet the recommendation of 3 years.

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4

@guineagirl96 is right. I didn’t read the question properly and assumed you had only Spanish I and II.

5

If you really want to go into linguistics you should consider taking some language as a Junior and Senior instead of going into college cold.

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6

@“Erin’s Dad” unfortunately, I forgot to mention I’m a high school senior so I can’t do much now. I’ve taken up to the junior level(Spanish 3) but only two years; took the first year of Spanish in middle SO started at Spanish 2.

7

@Endora @“Erin’s Dad” If it helps, I’m taking AP Psych right now and I’m fluent in Japanese and Mandarin despite not having taken it at school. I’m Chinese-Japanese but I took up to Spanish 3 at school from freshman to sophomore year. I can list it; I want to go into the speech technologies aspect of it not the foreign language. I just don’t know if they’ll take me seriously, haha.

8

Being fluent in a couple of languages in addition to taking to L3 in another besides English, you’ll be fine.

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9

UCSB will admit you as a “freshman” not as “linguistics major”. That’s not relevant to your evaluation. You get to choose what major once you attend.

My kiddo got into several top engineering programs for Comp Eng despite never taking a formal CompSci class. Her main EC was sports. As a hobby, she was a gamer, did freelance website design work, and adminned a creative writing forum. All her coding skills were self taught. I don’t even recall her listing any coding languages on her apps. She got into all schools applied.

They admitted her based on her transcript which showed she would do well in any major. CS was simply what she chose. The same with you – you choose Linguistics if that’s your desire – but you get admitted as a plain UCSB freshman. Good luck

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10

if you look at the admissions website for ucsb you can see how they evaluate frosh applicants. Should set your mind at rest.

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