What language should I take this fall?

[HardcoreRomantic]

French and German are the only two languages that really fit into my schedule (a night class twice a week for French, 8am class everyday for German). I doubt I'll do more than a year of either as I'd like to get a minor in Chinese, (didn't fit the schedule with other classes I needed this semester). I just really like languages, and since credits after 13 are "free" (sadly, the textbooks are not...), I figure I might as well make use of some time.

And just for the curious, major is going to be in applied plant science.

 

[CrackRabbit]

I would almost want to say French, simply because once you learn one of the "Romance" languages it is fairly easy to learn any of the others since they all have a common base of Latin.

Romance Languages = French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese

 

[HardcoreRomantic]

Well, I have a decent base in Spanish already (my mom's a Spanish teacher). I s'pose I could technically take both since the times don't interfere with each other.

Is that a bad idea?

 

[CrackRabbit]

I wouldn't don't want to confuse yourself when learning.
Since you know Spanish fairly well already if you took French you would notice the similarities fairly easily.

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

Deutsch

 

[Kromis]

Heil!

 

[cougar78]

Aside from taking advantage of taking a free language class, do you have any goals that would apply your language skills? Like a specific industry or career? French isn't too hard to learn, I took it in high school but I basically only remember the cuss words I taught myself, hehe.

Bottom line see if either one fit into a career you desire, otherwise I would say that if you are only going to take a year of the language, I'd have to say go with French considering you have a foundation in latin based languages, since you learning spanish. It will speed up your learning curve for French and therefore making it easier to retain more then if you took German that has no similarities to Spanish.

 

[FoBoT]

German

 

[intogamer]

Originally posted by: Fullmetal Chocobo
Deutsch

D for Deutschland

 

[tailes151]

I took french for 5 years and would suggest German.

 

[ForumMaster]

if you know spanish, french is very similar and you'll pick it up easily. take german.

 

[moshquerade]

Originally posted by: FoBoT
German

agree.

 

[imported_MadHatter]

Originally posted by: moshquerade

Originally posted by: FoBoT
German

agree.

Sie Germans, Tommy.

 

[DainBramaged]

I loved German but hated French.

 

[Mill]

German is a language more likely to be used in the sciences (your major). Plus, you already have one Romance language.

The benefit to French would be in your had business with French speaking Canadians or France.

My pick would be German, it has much more technical and science related speakers than French, and Germany exports a lot more than France, so it is likely you'd run into a greater need for it since there are less German/English speakers than French/English.

 

[Chaotic42]

German. They're due to start invading their neighbors again, and someone has to be on the front lines translating.

 

[LegendKiller]

Take French, become a retreating whimp. Take German, become a conquerer.

 

[GoingUp]

German.

They already mopped the floor with the frogs in 2 WWs.

 

[spidey07]

Take french. It will be much easier since you already have some spanish.

Ich habe zwei yahre im universitat. Ich kann nicht deutsch sprehce.

 

[MrDudeMan]

Originally posted by: CrackRabbit
I wouldn't don't want to confuse yourself when learning.
Since you know Spanish fairly well already if you took French you would notice the similarities fairly easily.

Being somewhat fluent in both languages, I would have to disagree with this completely. Spanish has a much harder grammar structure and French is way harder to learn to read/write/pronounce. They may have a common base of Latin, but they aren't alike at all. By the way, you forgot one of the romance languages: Romanian.

 

[MrPickins]

German. It's close to English in structure, which means you should be able to pick it up quickly.

 

[HardcoreRomantic]

yeah... I've never really seen too many similarities in Spanish and French. Sadly, the U doesn't offer Romanian. (personally, I'd love to learn Lithuanian. I've been taught to read it and have been told I read it well, I just don't understand it.) I don't understand how Romanian was forgotten as it wasn't an option for me to take...

 

[irishScott]

Of those 2, German. Personally, I find Irish Gealic to be kicka$$, but that's me...

 

[Rogodin2]

Russian

I've a minor in Russian and spent a few months in St.Pete and Moscow.

They've the largest remaining deposits of oil and natural gas on the planet.

I've also learned to enjoy the cyrilic alphabet

Rogo

 

[SsupernovaE]

Originally posted by: HardcoreRomantic
yeah... I've never really seen too many similarities in Spanish and French. Sadly, the U doesn't offer Romanian. (personally, I'd love to learn Lithuanian. I've been taught to read it and have been told I read it well, I just don't understand it.) I don't understand how Romanian was forgotten as it wasn't an option for me to take...

I don't know about that. I made the mistake of taking French and Spanish at the same time and they really confused me. German is more fun for me to speak.