Which language should I choose to learn?

[Fifteen]

<p>I am a freshmen and I major in English. Next year I have to choose a language to learn as my second language. From now on , I still can not decide it. Please give me some advice.</p>

[35elle]

<p>I think Spanish is a good choice, because this language is used by a lot of people. If you choose Spanish, it will be convenient to communicate to the most people in the world.</p>

[06Jessie]

<p>GERMAN, of course! I know you must be quite confused what I’m saying now. But I regard Germany as a very successful country. People there always be hardworking. If you want to participate in their society, just learn how to speak German.</p>

[Dave_Berry]

<p>German is a good language for technical pursuits. French is a good diplomatic language. Spanish is helpful if you shop at Lowe’s or Home Depot. :-)</p>

[ticklemepink]

<p>German- it’s in the same family tree as English. French and Spanish classes tend to fill up very fast… and a bit overcrowded. German classes tend to be smaller and less crowded. The smaller the classes are, the more time the prof has to devote to teaching the language.</p>

[PlattsburghLoser]

<p>Mandarin. Fun to learn, even more fun to show off.</p>

[Sligh_Anarchist]

<p>Deutsch! (German)</p>

[skp]

<p>German classes are smaller because the language is more difficult to learn and it’s used less often than languages like Spanish. I’d recommend Spanish - it’s much easier to learn.</p>

[AmandaisaGator]

<p>Spanish is useful (but not necessarily the primary language spoken) in all of the Western Hemisphere…and if you live in south Florida knowledge of at least basic Spanish is practically necessary. So I’d recommend that. However, if you have any intentions of working for the government, then choose ARABIC!</p>

[trojanchick99]

<p>Latin. It is a great language to learn as it is the basis for French, Italian, Spanish and some English. It is also a great way to improve your grammar.</p>

[yawn]

<p>Might as well repost some input I made regarding various languages you might be considering:</p>

<p>

In all honesty, you can make millions and millions of dollars without ever learning a language other than English. I’d suggest you spend all this time becoming a better engineer (internships, studying, practicing) rather than learning a language of which you will never reach native fluency.</p>

<p>Since you offered the “upsides”, I’ll counter them with some things to consider:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>Swedish - There are very few Nordic speakers in the world. Learn it only if you plan to live in Scandinavia.</p></li>
<li><p>German - Most Germans speak English quite well. Learn it only if you plan to live in Germanic Europe.</p></li>
<li><p>Spanish - Latin America isn’t known to have a particularly promising future, and Spanish is not really <em>that</em> mutually intelligible with Spanish. They’re two different languages for a reason. Portugal isn’t of much relevance, and Spain economic importance is less than those of France, Germany, and the UK.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>4.Hindi - India will soon become the largest English-speaking country in the world. Why not take advantage of that?</p>

<p>5.Chinese - Prepare to spend many, many years learning Chinese, particularly learning the thousands of pictorial symbols (26 letters? Heh…), and studying words that are spelled identically but pronounced four different ways to make four different words. Oh, and don’t plan using your Mandarin in Southeast China - particularly Hong Kong.</p>

<ol>
<li><p>French - If you’re going to learn French, you might as well learn German instead. China’s influence in Africa will soon far outweigh France’s.</p></li>
<li><p>Russian - Russia’s population is in decline (Russia also has the lowest life expectancy of any major country in the world, so you wouldn’t want to live there), and Central Asia hardly looks very promising from an economic standpoint.</p></li>
<li><p>Arabic - Unfortunately, most Arabic speakers happen to live in a little place called the “Middle East”. You’re probably not going to want to live there, especially if you end up getting a wife (assuming you two believe in women’s rights). As for Africa, again - China.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>Hopefully that didn’t sound too pessimistic, but I thought I may as well bring up important points to consider. If you didn’t get the gist, my point is that learning a language only helps if you’ll live in the region, and even then probably only if you learned it from a young age so as to be reasonably good at it without spending an excessively long amount of time learning it. If you’re approaching this from a money-making perspective, just stick with English, and you’ll be able to work with the USA, India, Nigeria, the UK, the Philippines, Germany, Canada, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, Singapore, Scandinavia, and select populations from almost all the other countries in the world.

</p>

<p>

In terms of difficulty, the writing systems are for the most part equally difficult. Verbally, Chinese is harder to pronounce and Japanese has more difficult grammar. On the grand scale, their difficulties are more or less equivalent.</p>

<p>As you know, China is poised to have the world’s largest economy within a decade or so. Japan, meanwhile, currently has the world’s third largest economy (after the US and China). China has many, many more people, both within China and worldwide, whereas Japan has a much smaller and rapidly declining population. On one hand, a bigger population might mean more potential business prospects; on the other hand, a declining population might mean more availability of jobs (and indeed, the need for immigration is a huge, controversial topic in contemporary Japanese politics).</p>

<p>Chinese are very nationalistic and will never see you as a fellow “countrymen”, no matter how long you live in China. The Japanese aren’t nearly as nationalistic; however, they’re very culturally unified and isolated, and, again, you’ll always be an outsider, even if you were born in Japan and lived there your whole life (I’m assuming you’re ethnically neither Chinese nor Japanese).</p>

<p>Culturally, Chinese has a very impressive ancient culture, though, of course, thanks to the Cultural Revolution and all that jazz, 20th century Chinese culture is very lacking and 21st-century Chinese culture is mainly derivative. Meanwhile, Japan’s history has continuously been very rich, and it obviously has quite an appeal worldwide. But most of the younger Japanese do not care for ancient Japanese culture, nor even 20th century Japanese icons.</p>

<p>So…noticing a trend? The two languages will lead to different albeit “equivalent” prospects. However, you should know that both languages are extremely difficult for an adult learner, and you will <em>never</em> acquire native fluency.</p>

<p>If you’re doing this for business reasons, you really would be better off just applying these hours and hours to something universally applicable, like accounting/engineering/finance/whatever, rather than focusing on something with only limited regional value. If you nonetheless want to learn an Asian language with good business potential, you may want to consider Vietnamese, which is easier than the latter two, and Vietnam is not nearly as “impacted” as China and Japan (aka, it’s best times are ahead, not behind). Also, Vietnam has a <em>very</em> young population (basically the exact opposite of Japan), so make of that what you will.</p>

<p>As you can see, there is no real clear-cut “better choice”. I find Japanese more culturally enriching (literature, cuisine, film, etc), Chinese more pragmatic (let’s face it, 1/5th of the world’s population is Chinese - you can’t beat those numbers), and Vietnamese particularly pleasant (I happen to love the Vietnamese language, plus Vietnam is a fairly pro-American country [unlike China, who mainly see us as their enemies], and if you’re a guy, the girls aren’t quite as spoiled ^_^).</p>

<p>As for myself, after hours and hours of researching and examining all sorts of different languages, I eventually decided it’d just be more productive to pursue non-linguistic endeavors that are universally applicable. But your choice is up to you.

</p>

<p>Yep…</p>

[Zamzam]

<p>Both German and Spanish are incredibly complicated when you get past the basics. The basics of Spanish may be easy, but there are numerous bizarre tenses that are difficult to learn and more difficult to know how to apply.</p>

<p>I personally think the study of German is good, because it is the most commonly-spoken language in Europe, and learning to adhere to the strict grammar rules will surely help with your English grammar as well.</p>

<p>That being said, I am also taking a Hebrew class next year. I think everyone should at least language that does not use the Latin alphabet.</p>

[somebodynew]

<p>If you’re planning on staying in the United States for a while, I’d seriously recommend Spanish.</p>

[Student92]

<p>French stays easy for about 3 years or so, and then you hit “high level grammar.” The French truly consider their language a part of their essence, and they take their rules VERY seriously. If you want to do something diplomatic, it’s a good option. If not, I’d go with Spanish (I sometimes wish I had).</p>

[yourfire_escape]

<p>I would suggest Chinese, as someone who has taken Chinese, French, and Latin.</p>

<p>Chinese is hard, so only do it if you want a challenge. The writing system uses about a billion little characters that are not similar to our own alphabet at all. (Although they do follow patterns and they are comprised of other symbols that have meaning/come from pictographs–this is the way I try to learn and it’s very helpful). Pronunciation is difficult, especially for Americans, but not impossible. So many people speak Chinese now, and China’s influence just keeps growing. If you want to go into business or something similar, they like Chinese, even if they don’t do business over there, since it shows you’re not afraid of a challenge. Same for other employers–it shows you can work hard and it puts you in a whole different category of applicants.</p>

<p>If you’re interested in grad school for English, you might want to figure out what region’s literature interests you the most. Then you should learn that language so you can read the literature in its original language.</p>

<p>If you want to travel a lot in a particular country, learn that language, as it will be very useful to you there.</p>

<p>Hope that helps!</p>

[arasam22]

<p>i’d say french maybe. okay, so i’m a little bit biased… but here are my reasons:</p>

<p>-french is close to english. during the norman conquest english absorbed a ton of french vocabulary… and so now even though the roots are germanic, i think something like 3/5 of the vocabulary is latin-based via french. so you’ll have a lot of vocabulary that is close–even things you wouldn’t expect. </p>

<p>(erase= effacer (efface)
to improve= ameliorer (ameliorate)
to ask = demander (demand))</p>

<p>those are just a few really random examples. there are tons more.</p>

<p>-if you’re an english major… i don’t know if you’ll be reading a lot of british literature, but i’ve found that there is a LOT of french in brit lit… so it’s pretty helpful to know some. there are also a lot of french phrases in english (although we MASSACRE the prononciation lol)</p>

<p>-French is the second official language of … the world basically! people always think that french isn’t very widely spoken except in france… not true!! a lot of people in northern and western africa speak it, as well as in other countries around europe!</p>

<p>anyways, i’m definitely not saying you should only take french. basiscally taking any foreign language will help you understand your own more fully. french is just the only language i’ve ever taken (taking german in college tho!!) so i’ve got a lot of reasons for it :D</p>

[sliversax]

<p>… A side question for anyone who has taken Japanese or knows about japanese classes… After taking one semester of Japanese how much do you learn? I’m guessing not all of the characters, but do you learn enough to read basic things and understand basic conversations? I am interested in taking at least one semester of Japanese later on so i was curious about this.</p>

[yawn]

<p>^ There are about 40 hiragana and katakana symbols. Much text can be written and read using these symbols, and you’ll learn them first. After those, there are about 2000 Chinese characters that are more useful in engaging in your sophisticated language. You probably won’t learn many, if any, of these in the first semester.</p>

[BearsBeetsBSG]

<p>I’d recommend picking a language from a country with a culture or history that interests you. I took Russian because I’m particularly fond of Russian literature. When you have that motivation to understand the history and culture associated with a language, it makes it a lot easier to learn. 3 years of high school spanish proved to me that you won’t learn anything if you don’t want to, despite getting good grades.</p>

[Shrinkrap]

<p>No one has mentioned Italian…</p>