So, could anyone help me decide the best foreign language for physics major?

terenc
Thu, 19 Jul 2012 00:48:46 +0000

It’s going to take more than 3-5 semesters to learn a language like Arabic. It will probably take you more than 4 years to be close to fluent, in fact.

While we’re talking about usefulness, Spanish is very useful because 1) There are many people in the US who speak Spanish and speak very poor English. 2) Spanish is the second largest language by # of native speakers (the top 5, in order, is Mandarin, Spanish, English, Hindi, and Arabic)

Furthermore, I would like to stress that you cannot learn any language to fluency (not even a language like German) unless you are committed to 1) studying abroad for at least 1 semester (in college, or over several summers) and 2) Continue to practice the language on a regular basis (because you will forget if you don’t use it). This is why I originally stated that the usefulness of a language is not relevant unless you are willing to make that commitment.

I’m not trying to be too harsh. I just don’t want you to be wasting your time. I took Spanish for 6 years in school (2 yrs middle school, 4 years high school), got a 5 on AP Language, and took AP Lit as well. I’m not close to fluent - I never studied abroad. I’m maybe slightly proficient - but that is really of no use to me, since almost any Hispanic person in the US will speak better English than I speak Spanish. Today I regret taking a language for which I did not have the commitment to see through to the end.