letsgo91

Hey everyone,

So i'm off to undergrad b-school in the fall and was hoping that i could get some input as to what languages are very good to learn for business (other than english). I already know French but I kind of want to start a new one, i was thinking Chinese or Russian...any input?

cjones120

I'm doing Chinese and was told its the best language to learn right now for business students.

nicksyn

This is a great question. I was wondering if a double major was possible to capitalize on learning new languages. I.e. linguistics while taking latin/Chinese/Greek/English/other language courses.

Sleepy_Sentry

There was just a huge thread about foreign languages and business a month ago. Search it and you'll find some good info.

I thought about doing Chinese, but for now am opting for Spanish. I realized that in the time it takes me to get any sort of proficiency with Chinese, I could master three Romance languages.

I think Chinese is useful but there is too much hype surrounding it. For one, anyone in China you could end up working with will know English. People who take Chinese are betting China will be a huge power in the future. While the country will no doubt be more powerful ten or twenty years from now, I think we will trade less with it then people speculate. The region is already oversaturated with factories and outsourcing and I think China will lose markets to other rising bigwigs like Brazil and India.

Did I mention Chinese is difficult? Keep in mind that even with four years of study, you will have very basic skills in the language. You will also be competing against native speakers in the United States.

So while everyone might be saying Chinese is the best language to learn right now, I think I'll stick with something else.

ifailedcalculus

Sleep_Sentry is right. The mandarin offered in university is very elementary. I speak Chinese and although in the motherland my Chinese is considered terrible, I was placed in senior level Chinese my freshman year of university. Even my high school Chinese class was harder.

syncastar

you should also opt for Arabic since the middle east are becoming huge and we'll always need some use of oil plus there aren't many Americans that know Arabic and that's a huge bonus for companies because they don't need to rely on a Muslim to do business in Africa & Middle east.