If You Had to Pick between...
Portugese, Russian, French, Hindi for a foreign language, which one would you choose? I want to probably work in the energy or computer industry (probably electrical), and would like to do finance in this particular area probably, so which one would you pick. Here are the reasons why I'd like to study one of these:
Portugese: I really like Brazil (where it is a national language) and it is close to spanish, which means that it will help me remember spanish, and will be easier for me to learn (this is important b/c I'm probably going to major in engineering)
Russian and French: French I like because it's the most international language since it's spoken almost everywhere, and Russian I think would just be cool, although it would be hard as well.
Hindi: I'm Indian and it would be nice to learn this better. Plus, I think India is a booming market (especially in the computer industry obviously), so it might be good to know.
so yeah, which one would you choose?
.
Why do people waste time with French...its as useless as the level of productivity over there.
As far as productivity levels are concerned, I respectfully disagree. The following OECD study shows this is actually not the case: http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/31/7/29880166.pdf
You can go straight to page 10.
I don't know what junkbondswap was referring to but I just cannot bring myself to respect a 35 hour work week. And please don't tell me public health system works...
Since when was French the most international language and spoken everywhere???? I agree Russian might be good, but Chinese would probably be better.
Arabic.
NEVER lose your BlackBerry www.conveniencesoftware.com
Portugese or Russian, because Brazil and Russia are part of the BRIC, you said you were interested in emerging markets. Hindi would be nice, as a fellow indian I regret not knowing how to turn the mack on some hot indian women in ther native tounge, but i guess it is useless for IB because everyone there speaks English
What I've come to realize...
If you intend to major in something totally unrelated (especially in the maths/sciences, I actually intended on doing Physics and now switched into maths) realize the time commitment you are making,and more importantly the course commitment. If you are serious about pursuing engineering, including the language courses, just about all of your courses should be thus taken up, removing about all elective choices (not sure how it works at your school, but for me, in a really liberal school with few requirements). Personally I see this is not worth it, seeing as college is about exploring and having fun.
Basically don't set your mindset purely to engineering, I'd recommend exploring a few things the first year especially, as you never know what you'll be taken by. (Engineering also has tons of labs floating around which imo where quite horrible...)
As far as the actual language goes, I'm not sure if you speak spanish or not fluently, since you say you want to remember it when you take portuguese, so I'd highly recommend continuing spanish to gain complete fluency, study abroad in Spain, Argentina, or wherever. Not to mention hispanic culture is kickass. And Russian is one of the hardest languages. Can't imagine Arabic (especially the writing) being much better.
A few things to recognize... Perhaps in the far future Portuguese will be very helpful, but if you master Spanish now (and continue to speak it w. friends from whereever, much easier in the states to keep speaking and thus keep up than portuguese) you will be able to understand about 50% of portuguese, and will be able to pick it up relatively quickly. Not sure how important Arabic is... it seems like in the Middle East English is far sufficient... See above for Hindi... And really really think hard if you want to live in Russia as it is...
(Just my two sense, coming from someone who's been there)
Note*, on the other hand if you just want to learn a language for fun, go for whatever interests you, especially the culture (study abroad etc) :)
Gl!
Russian or French
Obviously Russian would be considerably more difficult
French is very international, they speak it all over South America after all.
Either you're being sarcastic or you're talking BS >>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_language
Perhaps you're confusing French with Spanish...
Russian is not that hard, plus it just sounds a lot cooler than Hindi, less gay then French, and Portguese you might as well learn Spanish then Portugese is cake after that. Also if your going to be an analyst in NYC, you gotta hit up Brighton Beach for the pelmeni. Pizdets
Take what you enjoy man, if you're taking a language just to boost your chances are you really going to stick with it?
well, I think I'd enjoy all of them equally, so that's not the problem. So since they are basically all the same for me as far as interest is concerned, I'm now asking what you guys think would be best.
It seems portugese isn't getting much love. I already know a good amount of spanish (conversational at least I think), so is it OK to take portugese (I'm kinda leaning towards portugese or hindi now, but you guys say french or russian lol)
Yeah, I'm just fucking around; a roundabout way of expressing my opinion that it doesn't matter at all what language he learns, or that he learns one at all.
If you really want to learn a foreign language, I would highly recommend to learn Arabic. There are a lot of wealthy Arabs who are continuously buying stake and shares of big financial services firms such as Citigroup. That being said, there is a chance that the middle east might be one of the emerging markets in the future. In addition, they have oil more than any other nation in the world in countries like Kuwait, UEA, and Saudi Arabia.
double post.
Arabic? Please, this language is just a fad because of the state we are in. There oil supply isn't infinite dutch disease cough. The Russian markets(and former soviet republics) is an untapped gold mine. This place is the next up and comer.
Arabic also takes like 8-10 years to speak fluently---fuck that.
Seems that Russian is the winner?
I find it hard to believe that you would pick up Russian in a quicker time than Arabic... Go French.
I disagree. I have friends who majored in Russian. They are not yet fluent but diffinetly advanced conversationally. My ex girlfriend majored in Arabic and is still not even conversational after 3 years and she was the top student in her class. I guess Arabic just isn't offered or taught at a high degree like the other more "well-known" languages
Maybe your ex was in the remedial class.
^^ouch.
So why exactly Russian, and how in the world is it easy? I mean, you have to learn the cryllic alphabet, and are there really that many opportunities for banking/consulting in Russia vs any Spanish-speaking country or Brazil? Remember, I'm trying to mostly learn a second language so that I'll have more opportunities to do banking or consulting in another country, in which it will greatly benefit me to know their language.
So for example, when recommending a language, say something like learn Hindi because there are lots of opportunities to work abroad in India vs something like learn Hindi because India is part of BRIC. I am interested in emerging markets but only because I'm guessing that these markets have more jobs in banking since their industry is growing, so yeah. It's great that X country is going to be a world power, but realistically, that probably won't happen until I'm about to retire anyways, so I don't see the point of me learning a language because 50 years from now when I'm dead it will help me get a job. I'm talking right now what would be the best language to learn for these jobs.
And I guess we can add arabic and mandarin back in because these keep getting brought up anyways.
Geez some of you talk a LOT.
If those are the only choices, I'd go French. http://www.fll.vt.edu/French/francophonie.html
[quote=LizzieJane]Geez some of you talk a LOT.
If those are the only choices, I'd go French. http://www.fll.vt.edu/French/francophonie.html[/quote] Your right, I forgot about all those banking opportunities in Mali and Djibouti and the rest of Africa.haha
Wasn't implying that he should chose them bc of all the banking opps. Just figured it was a bit more flex overall.
Most people find Russian grammar extremely difficult to deal with. I personally believe that the best way to learn a language like Russian is by speaking with locals. I understand that it would be hard to do that here in th US. BTW, the alphabet is easy to learn and should take day at max.
you'll find hindi almost useless...anyone that you'd be interacting with on a professional basis would have at least an adequate level of fluency in English.
Arabic - it will be a long time before they lose oil, but they don't have that much industry besides oil...
Go for Russian or Portuguese. I'd say Portuguese because I think Brazil's economy will be stronger than Russia's in the long run. A lot of Russia's boom is due to oil and commodities. Same w/ Brazil but to a lesser extent.
And I personally find Brazilian chicks hotter than Russian ones...maybe that should also be a factor in your decision.
Are you even considering German? I think German would be more relevant than French, but that's just me...
Most Germans in business speak flawless English, so why bother learning German?
And French is so much sexier than German.
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