Arabic appeals to me a LOT - middle eastern culture fascinates me. Could also have some short-term practical advantages.
spanish would be immediately practical, and there are many people to practice with.
russian would be solely for personal enrichment (these all are, but russian really wouldn't have any of the other advantages that arabic and spanish would).

I'll also be in Advanced german grammar. Because of this, i'm more inclined to take spanish, knowing that I pick it up relatively easily, and I won't have another alphabet to learn.

does anyone have any input, or any other considerations that i haven't considered?

4/10/2006 6:35:54 PM

there is more than one middle eastern language.

4/10/2006 11:04:37 PM

There's a thread about half way down the page on Arabic. It's got some good information on the class in there. I am a spanish major, and enjoy my Arabic courses. The new alphabet isn't that big of a deal, and it corresponds to a lot of other languages. Above anything else, I'd take Arabic.

4/10/2006 11:08:48 PM

everybody speaks spanish

be special, learn Arabic

4/10/2006 11:54:00 PM

Quote :

"there is more than one middle eastern language."

I'm aware of this. Hebrew is on my "it'd sure be nice!" list of languages to learn. Arabic is the most widespread.

^^that thread is what made me really consider it at all.

4/11/2006 12:40:58 AM

I took Arabic for 3 semesters a few years ago; my only complaint was that the book was fucked up in how it introduced words... you know how most language texts have sections on "The Airport" or "The Grocery Store," etc? Well, this Arabic text you get (I assume it's still the same one) makes up a new paragraph about nothing in particular each chapter and then teaches you all the unrelated, random words in it.

That sucked.

The professor is frickin' awesome, if it's still Jodi Khater. She's really nice and patient.

4/11/2006 1:01:20 AM

she is. i hear so many good things about her.

[Edited on April 11, 2006 at 1:19 AM. Reason : lkj]

4/11/2006 1:18:54 AM

since it's purely an enrichment type of class, since german's taking care of any foreign language requirements, learn a language you think you'd really ENJOY. i enjoy spanish, to a degree, but if I was taking for purely enrichment, I'd take arabic. which I'm thinking about doing, maybe spring or fall 07, just to get an intro to it, basically.

i'd say for you, do arabic. i doubt you'd really enjoy spanish classes.

4/11/2006 7:06:30 AM

the arabic class is taught kinda backwards, you spend the first 2/3 of the class learning the alphabet (mind you, four forms for each letter depending on where the letter is in a word/sentence) and vocab based on learned alphabet then finally you start to learn a little grammar near the end

by the end of the first class you won't be able to have any sort of conversation outside of "hi how are you my name is ____ praise be to Allah"

it takes a larger commitment to learn than spanish. or hindi for that matter.


i would suggest taking hindi or spanish instead, they are equally easy to learn and you will get a bit more out of it if you only plan on taking one semester.

4/11/2006 10:09:03 AM

I liked my spanish professors. Arabic or Russian might be fun, but I need alot of practice to maintain what I've learned, so those would never be an option for me.

4/11/2006 11:12:49 AM

Arabic is the official language in 22 countries

who gives a fuck about hindi, indians speak english better than americans themselfs

4/11/2006 3:16:04 PM

i was in russian for awhile... pronunciation isn't hard, at least it wasn't for me, the only thing that was kinda hard was learning cyrillic (sp?).... otherwise, i thought it was fun... just didn't have the time to dedicate to learning the language... the professor was really nice

4/11/2006 5:25:08 PM

arabic. go get hired by the government.

4/11/2006 9:59:03 PM

what mattc said was about what I had feared.

I think i'm gonna go with spanish, simply because
- more folks around to practice with
- gives broader edge when looking for jobs, and will help with volunteer work
- no new alphabet
- more sections at all levels, so should i find another hole in my schedule, it'll be more likely that i can continue in spanish, whereas i probably couldn't for arabic

^I'm not gonna pursue any other language to that depth for a while (read: grad school)

4/11/2006 11:27:45 PM

Russian really is a fun language and the alphabet isn't hard at all to pick up on (though I'll admit that I still had a tendency to say the English letter instead when I was reading quickly). I think there are a few sections offered so it might be easy to fit into your schedule.

4/12/2006 12:24:48 AM