best university for Chinese(studies)

Hi all
So I'm currently thinking of doing Chinese at uni and I was wondering if anyone has any recommendations for unis that have good Chinese courses? I was looking at sheffield, Cardiff, Manchester Leeds and a couple more. Are any of you studying Chinese at uni now? If so, what are your courses like?

Reply 1

Snufkin

Universities Forum Helper

21

How do you define 'good'? Cambridge, Oxford and SOAS probably offer the most comprehensive Chinese degrees, but if you're not interested in classical Chinese, ancient history or literature then these places are not for you.

Reply 2

wolfmoon88

21

Some global options:

Asia:
China:
- Peking University
- Tsinghua University
- Beijing Foreign Studies University

Hong Kong:
- University of Hong Kong
- Chinese University of Hong Kong

Taiwan:
- National Taiwan University
- National Taiwan Normal University

USA:
- University of Hawaii
- Harvard University
- UC Berkeley
- John Hopkins University
- Stanford University
- University of Washington
- New York University

(edited 7 years ago)

Reply 3

Bruce bu

good idea.My Chinese is best.

Reply 4

cambio wechsel

20

Original post by Bruce bu

good idea.My Chinese is best.

I dare say, Bruce. And your English, while apparently not perfect, is likely better than will be this fellow's even after he has completed his degree.

Not just yours, either: there are tens and possibly hundreds of millions of Chinese chaps who have been studying Engish since they were kneehigh to a whatsit. Tens of thousands of these are now struggling to reverse park their cars at British universities.

Which all obliges me to wonder after the marketability of a BA in Chinese.

But of course if the OP is only fascinated by the Qing Dynasty or whatever then why not.

Reply 5

Bruce bu

Original post by cambio wechsel

I dare say, Bruce. And your English, while apparently not perfect, is likely better than will be this fellow's even after he has completed his degree.

Not just yours, either: there are tens and possibly hundreds of millions of Chinese chaps who have been studying Engish since they were kneehigh to a whatsit. Tens of thousands of these are now struggling to reverse park their cars at British universities.

Which all obliges me to wonder after the marketability of a BA in Chinese.

But of course if the OP is only fascinated by the Qing Dynasty or whatever then why not.

your Chinese history is good. I am pleasure to talk with you about the history.

Reply 6

wolfmoon88

21

Original post by cambio wechsel

I dare say, Bruce. And your English, while apparently not perfect, is likely better than will be this fellow's even after he has completed his degree.

Not just yours, either: there are tens and possibly hundreds of millions of Chinese chaps who have been studying Engish since they were kneehigh to a whatsit. Tens of thousands of these are now struggling to reverse park their cars at British universities.

Which all obliges me to wonder after the marketability of a BA in Chinese.

But of course if the OP is only fascinated by the Qing Dynasty or whatever then why not.

I would honestly go abroad for a degree in Mandarin. If it is historical and cultural interests, going to one of the East Asian countries would also definitely be better in terms of access to resources and research. However, one thing that I think makes it hard for British people to study abroad is the language because all teaching is in Mandarin and many people's Mandarin level in high school in East Asian countries end up being higher than British people who finished a BA degree in Mandarin.

I think going abroad for one year to learn the language in a language studies program (I think Beijing Foreign Studies University has one, NTU in Taiwan definitely has one, and I think Peking and Tsinghua both have these programs as well) would be more beneficial in terms of learning the language using immersion at a faster rate than a BA degree in Mandarin.

However like you said, if the OP has a cultural/historical interest in China, a BA degree in Mandarin is definitely ok.

Reply 7

super_kawaii

20

Original post by LMJT

Hi all
So I'm currently thinking of doing Chinese at uni and I was wondering if anyone has any recommendations for unis that have good Chinese courses? I was looking at sheffield, Cardiff, Manchester Leeds and a couple more. Are any of you studying Chinese at uni now? If so, what are your courses like?

I studied Chinese Studies at Sheffield Uni, so if you have any questions, let me know.

Posted from TSR Mobile

Reply 8

sophia1928

12

Original post by super_kawaii

I studied Chinese Studies at Sheffield Uni, so if you have any questions, let me know.

Posted from TSR Mobile

Hi, sorry to piggyback on this thread. I was just also thinking about applying for a Chinese degree.
I would mainly be interested in the courses offered at:
Cambridge
Durham
Warwick
UCL
Does anyone have have any ideas on if this is a good degree to do.
The reason I like the courses at these unis is because they have a lot of focus on culture and you are able to study the politics of china.
In the future I would like to work in the foreign office or international relations in general.

Reply 9

Snufkin

Universities Forum Helper

21

Original post by sophia1928

Hi, sorry to piggyback on this thread. I was just also thinking about applying for a Chinese degree.
I would mainly be interested in the courses offered at:
Cambridge
Durham
Warwick
UCL

UCL does not do Chinese?

Reply 10

wolfmoon88

21

Original post by Snufkin

UCL does not do Chinese?

Yep they don't do Chinese

Posted from TSR Mobile

Reply 11

sophia1928

12

Original post by wolfmoon88

Yep they don't do Chinese

Posted from TSR Mobile

They do a joint French and Chinese course, Chinese is taught at soas but French at ucl. You get the degree from ucl tho.
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-students/undergraduate/degrees/french-asian-african-language-ba/

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 12

Snufkin

Universities Forum Helper

21

Original post by sophia1928

They do a joint French and Chinese course, Chinese is taught at soas but French at ucl. You get the degree from ucl tho.
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-students/undergraduate/degrees/french-asian-african-language-ba/

If you look on the SOAS website, it says "Arabic, Hausa, Hindi, Indonesian, Persian, Swahili, Thai, and Turkish may be combined with French, which is taught at University College London UCL"

https://www.soas.ac.uk/departments/joint/programmes/bafrench/

Reply 13

sophia1928

12

Original post by Snufkin

If you look on the SOAS website, it says "Arabic, Hausa, Hindi, Indonesian, Persian, Swahili, Thai, and Turkish may be combined with French, which is taught at University College London UCL"

https://www.soas.ac.uk/departments/joint/programmes/bafrench/

oh dear, didn't see that, thank you. never mind, I like the other options.

best university for Chinese(studies)

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