<p>I'm curious to know what one would actually do withh a degree/degrees in a foreign language. It seems like most of the obvious options (translation, government work, etc.) would be best suited to native speakers.</p>
<p>That's a good question. The even more relevant question might be, what do any of those people get paid?</p>
<p>Teach .</p>
<p>A decent Japanese translator who's native tounge is English can pull in 100K+ a year EASY. Mandarin would be the language of the future to learn, unless their economy goes in the crapper.</p>
<p>Your question has many answers. The appropriate answer depends in part on which language you're talking about. Here are a few things to think about.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Your "major" at college typically takes up no more than about 25% of your total course work/credits. Often, a more relevant question than the one you asked is, suppose I major in X, what should I do with the remaining 75% of my credits? Some of those will, of course, be general college distribution or core requirements, but many will be electives, certificates, or second majors or minors. Some will go well with a language focus (e.g., international relations, business -- there are many others).</p></li>
<li><p>Some languages are considered "Less commonly taught languages" (LICTL's) and because there is a strategic need for speakers/readers of such languages you can get federal government subsidies to help you to study them. Turkic languages (Turkish, Uzbek, Kazakh, etc.), Persian, Arabic, and many many others would qualify. For some types of employment, your status as an American citizen can be important to your using those languages in government or business work.</p></li>
<li><p>More generally, having good command of another language, coupled with knowledge of relevant cultures and experience in the field, is a great "extra" when you are seeking employment in any business that has a strong international component. They often cannot and do not want to rely just on native speakers, or on foreigners.</p></li>
<li><p>Studying a foreign language has a lot of intrinsic value that you shouldn't try to put into some simply calculus of utility to you. Again keep in mind point 1 above. But knowing another language well gives you access to literatures and thinking beyond your native language and culture. It can be extremely enjoyable and rewarding on its own terms. At this stage in my life, I'm still interested in adding more foreign language competency (beyond Russian and a bit of Spanish and German) for these reasons.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Where does someone find the examples of majoring in a foreign language by a monolingual native speaker of English being a good investment of time and effort?</p>
<p>I have a couple in my own extended family, who are now in business but majored in French at LAC's.</p>
<p>Beyond that the ranks of academic language/literature departments in the U.S. are staffed with a great many non-native speakers of those languages. In the foreign service you are going to find quite a few more.</p>
<p>a friend who is fairly fluent in Russian and Georgian was being recruited by the CIA, but she wasn't interested.Lots of opportunities for those who speak something other than English.</p>
<p>The thrust of my question is, do any of the examples you know make a better living than people who simply pursued a pure-play business major, or an engineering degree, or something of the like? The CIA doesn't really pay very well, and most government language-based jobs pay even worse than the CIA pays. The NSA pays language majors decently, but it pays math majors a lot better, I think.</p>
<p>It's not what you can do with a foreign language alone. It's what the foreign language can help you do in other fields. I think mackinaw touched on this. You would be a tremendous asset to a foreign firm in their New York office if you spoke their native language in addition to English. Then you would be a great candidate for an overseas posting. This would be especially true for a Japanese or Chinese bank for example, but it would even help for a German or Italian firm where most of the employees speak English. Being a translator or a teacher are the most narrow applications of a foreign language major that I can think of. The actual possiblities are unlimited. </p>
<p>If you only choose a major based on how much you think you can earn you will likely end up miserable.</p>
<p>joev, yeah, how bout being the fulltime translator for Hideki Matsui or one of the other Japanese baseball players in the U.S. ?? Nice work if you can get it!! :) ....Japanese ballplayer yacks on and on for 5 minutes... translator says, "He says 'thank you very much I love New York!!!!' "</p>
<p>I agree with Njres. The skill of speaking something other than english serves you in whatever field you enter. The world is a pretty small place and being able to speak and read another language is important for virtually everyone.
My brother in law works for World Bank and speaks 5 languages, ( his wife speaks 7). They make a very good living if that is a concern.
A friend works for Adobe as a writer and also makes a very good living, she speaks so many languages that I have lost count.
My daughters major ( biology) strongly suggests taking French or German, and I think it is required for graduate school. ( she had 5 years of Spanish in high school and two years of Latin)
a language can facilitate your ambition in any career.</p>
<p>My husband has had a wonderful career as a journalist -- reporter, top editor at a major metro, and journalism prof with his undergrad and master's degrees in a foreign language.</p>
<p>Okay, again I ask, in the instances mentioned, how many of the people are monolingual native speakers of English who majored in a foreign language (as I am, and did)? That I think was the point of the original poster's question, and my interest in the question is prompted by my direct experience with the issue. Contrast the situation the OP brings up with either </p>
<p>a) being a monolingual native speaker of English who majors in any one of a hundred liberal arts subjects, and takes some language courses on the side, </p>
<p>or </p>
<p>b) being a first-generation immigrant who learns English as a second language. </p>
<p>How does the first situation, the situation the OP asked about, compare to situation a) or situation b)?</p>
<p>In the instances I mentioned my brother in law is Columbian, English is a 2nd language he also speaks Japanese, French, & Russian. His wife is Japanese, so english is a 2nd languages as are all her other languages
The Adobe writer is a phd candidate in Egyptology from Brown and is a native speaker of English</p>
<p>Husband was first generation college, and comes from a family that is completely English speaking. He is black, started learning German in 3rd grade, and ended up majoring it in college and in grad school, where he originally was on a doctoral path, but settled for a masters when he realized he was more interested in journalism. He is gifted in languages, and speaks German so much like a native that I have seen Germans ask him in person whether he is German.</p>
<p>His linguistic skills definitely gave him a big leg up in journalism.</p>
<p>A monolingual native speaker of English who takes some language courses on the side is IMO not usually going to have the level of fluency that will give them a leg up in jobs in which knowing a foreign language is a big advantage.</p>
<p>A first generation immigrant who knows English fluently (note "fluently") and also is conversant with American culture as well as their parents' culture would probably have an advantage if pitted for a job against the monolingual native speaker of English who isn't fluent. </p>
<p>Fluency is hard to obtain. Frankly, even with a college major in a foreign language, one isn't likely to be fluent unless one has also spent considerable time in a country in which one has to speak that foreign language.</p>
<p>Northstarmom wrote, "Fluency is hard to obtain. Frankly, even with a college major in a foreign language, one isn't likely to be fluent unless one has also spent considerable time in a country in which one has to speak that foreign language."</p>
<p>Indeed. Congratulations to your husband, by the way, for getting so far in German. I have tested at the 4+ level in speaking and understanding Mandarin Chinese in federal government language testing. Of course I think I learned a lot more of the languge after a span (three years, in my first case) of foreign residence than I did in my undergraduate major courses. There is MUCH criticism of undergraduate major programs in foreign languages in the United States. A rather striking example mentioned in an unlikely place, Steven Krantz's book How to Teach Mathematics, is some unnamed university where the engineering school was so disgusted with the uselessness of the Japanese language courses offered at that university that it finally hired its own Japanese teacher to teach PRACTICAL Japanese-language courses to engineering majors outside the East Asian Languages department. (Hmmm, I'd like to know the name of that school.) </p>
<p>I didn't want to be prickly in this thread, but I did want to be responsive to the OP's question. I have a STRONG bias toward majoring in a modern foreign language--that's what I did, and that's all I considered doing when I applied to college--but I have real-world experience with the consequences of being a foreign-language major in America's job market. Study of foreign languages does much to help the learner learn his or her own native language well. (Is this what you have in mind in describing your husband's experiences, or did he specifically interview people in German or live in a German-speaking country as he began his journalistic career?) </p>
<p>I think mackinaw's first reply makes the sensible point that every college graduate brings other things to the table besides the graduate's major subject when going out in the real world. Personally, I should have had a lot more "business sense." I was kind of a Ralph-Nader-style skeptic about free enterprise when I graduated from college, full of ideas about how to do good for society in the abstract but not too aware of how to develop a body of skills to trade for other people's money to make my living. I learned the little business sense I know mostly overseas, so in that indirect sense my language major helped me thrive in a postgraduate environment in which I learned things I needed to learn. </p>
<p>But while you were replying, I went back and looked up the OP's earlier posts, to see what career ambitions the OP has expressed. I would be the first to recommend advanced study of a foreign language to ANYONE--indeed one of the advantages foreigners have compared to Americans internationally is that they can't finish their secondary educations without learning a foreign language. And I would never dissuade a college applicant from pursuing a personal passion. But I would be wary of expending a lot of time and money in majoring in a foreign language unless there is some career path at the end of the process that is satisfying to the applicant--which perhaps is what the applicant is asking about here.</p>
<p>" (Is this what you have in mind in describing your husband's experiences, or did he specifically interview people in German or live in a German-speaking country as he began his journalistic career?) "</p>
<p>My husband became truly fluent in German when he spent a year studying in Germany during grad school. His first journalism job was a summer internship in Germany where he was the only American working for a magazine, where he wrote in German.</p>
<p>This unusual experience made him stand out -- big time-- when he interviewed for his first professional journalism job. He was hired by one of the country's largest and best papers, which must have passed over many other applicants with more extensive journalism experience. His language fluency and knowledge of other cultures also helped him rise very quickly to an assistant editing position where he was the youngest person on the desk.</p>
<p>His reason for not pursuing a doctorate in German was that he was not interested in becoming a German professor, which was the main career that he felt that doctorate would have prepared him for. The masters combined with a masters in journalism has served him very well. An undergrad language major combined with a journalism masters probably would have accomplished a similar end.</p>
<p>There are 2 types of post-secondary education available, and since both are offered at colleges (indeed usually at the same college) it can blur the distinction. The first is the vocational-type degree (engineering, accounting, nursing, etc). The other type falls into the umbrella of the liberal arts. </p>
<p>The reason the distinction is worth keeping in mind is that without it we can in effect mix metaphors. tokenadult writes "I would be wary of expending a lot of time and money in majoring in a foreign language unless there is some career path at the end of the process that is satisfying to the applicant--which perhaps is what the applicant is asking about here". But this is applying a vocational-education measure to a liberal-arts pursuit. None of the liberal-arts majors lead directly to a career path, nor are they intended to. The reason to pick a liberal-arts major or minor is because of a strong interest in the subject. It may also be applicable to some career fields, as the examples of foreign language and business already given illustrate. But that is not the main goal; if you want a degree that prepares you for a job, pick a vocational major.</p>
<p>Jobs are always a concern for liberal-arts majors, but the way to look at this is that preparing for a career is something that is done in addition to the major rather than being the result of the major. There are plenty of things to do in college to prepare for a career. Learning about careers by talking to alums and thru the career center resources is a first step. The most important thing are internships so that you get actual exposure to the job and can explain to potential employers why you would be a good fit in the career rather than just hoping its right for you.</p>
<p>I second the opinion above that picking majors solely for money-making potential is not wise. More than one college pal went all the way through professional school before realizing they did not love their field!</p>
<p>I am fluent in French, having learned it a bit in HS and college and then really learned it while living in France after college. I recently decided to start Italian lessons. I love being able to communicate in another language. I think there is a certian amount of brain exercise when one is forced to think in different patterns and constructions as well.</p>
<p>My good friend in college was fluent in French from lycee, became fluent in Japanese during college (also did an internship in Japan at Fuji,) and upon graduation had excellent offers at Fuji and elsewhere. After a few years in Japan, she wound up with her own US consulting firm for international businesses. Great income, but even better in autonomy, flexibility, kid-friendly hours, etc. </p>
<p>I am encouraging my D, who has no idea what she wants to do in life, to continue her language study and become tri-lingual, just as a boost to whatever career appeals to her later.</p>
<p>My daughter wanted to major in vocal performance in college. From my perspective as a university voice teacher, I knew what a difficult thing it would be for her to be successful. She was also a National Merit finalist and had acquired many college credits from AP courses, etc. We made a deal with her that she could do the voice degree if she also did another liberal arts degree, thinking she would be better prepared to change career course to something like law (having great confidence in her argumentative skills!) She chose to do the second degree in foreign languages, principally German. During her graduate study she applied for a Rotary fellowship to study opera in Germany. Most of the other candidates applied for fellowships in English speaking countries, so the German prowess was quite an advantage in the application process. She was granted a fellowship, gained admission to an opera program at the Hochschule in Hamburg (three accepted out of 350 auditionees), and has since developed quite a nice career in Germany, where a classical singer can make a living singing. Without the German study she would not have gotten the Rotary fellowship and she would not be where she is now. Clearly even with her considerable talent, the extra asset was the language fluency, because they would not have accepted her there without it.</p>