<p>I kind of want to study arabic, however Im cautious because I feel like there arent many job opportunities. I’ve always wanted to work and live overseas, I was looking into the CIA but besides them, who else offers jobs to linguists?</p>
<p>To be a linguist you need a degree in linguistics, not Arabic. Linguistics can be very lucrative depending on what you combine it with. If you do computer science, you’re guaranteed a well-paying job. If you learn a language to fluency, you can work as a translator or for an international business. But just majoring in Arabic won’t get you near the level you’d need to work for the CIA.</p>
<p>drudkh is right.
You can study Arabic for four years and you still won’t be close to fluent. Plus the language you study is Modern Standard, which no one actually speaks. It’s kind of like studying Latin so that you can go to Italy and speak Italian. That being said, though, you might not be able to work as a translator, but if you are interested in government work having any Arabic is a huge plus. The FBI, State Department, DEA, and a ton of other government agencies would love to have you. The military would love to have you, as would a lot of private contractors.</p>
<p>As drudkh said, computational linguistics is a burgeoning field with many lucrative, well paying jobs. Linguistics + Computer Science will help you prepare for a career in this sector.</p>