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Learning Arabic/Mandarin

I’m starting uni in September and I have the opportunity to learn a modern Asian language - either Mandarin or Arabic. Which one would you say is more useful in finance/international relations? Thanks🙂
Original post by Bazyli
I’m starting uni in September and I have the opportunity to learn a modern Asian language - either Mandarin or Arabic. Which one would you say is more useful in finance/international relations? Thanks🙂

IR - both

finance - Mandarin.

they are both very hard languages to learn, with mandarin being much harder.
Reply 2
Original post by A Rolling Stone
IR - both

finance - Mandarin.

they are both very hard languages to learn, with mandarin being much harder.

Yeah I’m slightly more interested in Arabic. I think they’re both very relevant- hopefully knowledge of either will be a useful skill to have
Reply 3
I love learning Arabic, so I’ll probably say that. Don’t know about the usefulness of it though
Reply 4
Original post by Megxn0
I love learning Arabic, so I’ll probably say that. Don’t know about the usefulness of it though

Oh. I like the language but I’m also learning it to help widen my career prospects
Reply 5
Does anyone else have an idea
Mandarin - its a fun language to learn + its easier than Arabic (for me anyway).

Many companies interact with Chinese relations so I’m sure it would be useful in many ways as well.
But if you’re heading to UAE for the big money, I’d say Arabic is worth it.
(edited 4 years ago)
What degree will you be doing? :rambo:
Reply 9
Original post by officialmay
But if you’re heading to UAE for the big money, I’d say Arabic is worth it.

I guess it’s an option , as is heading to China I suppose. National security and diplomacy alphabet always interested me though. It’s hard to choose!
Reply 10
Original post by Quick-use
What degree will you be doing? :rambo:

International relations at lse🙂 I’ve chosen to do the language specialism so my degree will be ‘IR with Mandarin/Arabic’
Original post by Bazyli
I guess it’s an option , as is heading to China I suppose. National security and diplomacy alphabet always interested me though. It’s hard to choose!


If you find it hard to choose, I guess asking 2nd year or 3rd year students would help. Best way I’ve found to contact ambassadors is through Facebook (for my course anyway).
Reply 12
Original post by officialmay
If you find it hard to choose, I guess asking 2nd year or 3rd year students would help. Best way I’ve found to contact ambassadors is through Facebook (for my course anyway).

Yeah maybe that’s a good idea. I’m not sure which is harder but I’ve heard that Arabic has more similarities to European languages?
Why not both? Obviously not going to be easy though
Reply 14
Original post by Wooord
Why not both? Obviously not going to be easy though

I can only do one as part of my degree (it’ll comprise 25% of my total credits)
Original post by Bazyli
International relations at lse🙂 I’ve chosen to do the language specialism so my degree will be ‘IR with Mandarin/Arabic’

In that case, I might recommend Arabic. Most IR departments in the UK focus on the Middle East. So, it could be relevant to your primary subject.

It's completely up to you, though. I'd highly encourage you to do the language you're most interested in. It makes becoming fluent much, much easier. Either will be fantastic! :rambo:
Original post by Bazyli
Yeah maybe that’s a good idea. I’m not sure which is harder but I’ve heard that Arabic has more similarities to European languages?


I personally found Arabic awfully hard but mandarin seems to be quite compatible for me.

Mandarin is quite interesting and most of the words are familiar to me I don’t know how - you know when you have the feeling that a certain word means something - like it just makes sense. Yeah I’m all in favour of learning mandarin lol

As for Arabic being similar, you might be right. I studied french and they are quite similar actually - the way you add a few letters at the end to change the tense, number or gender.

For me, the words in Arabic were too foreign and just didn’t stick like mandarin did. And addition to that, I did start watching Chinese movies and tv shows to help me improve - maybe that’s what made learning mandarin easier. For Arabic I didn’t do that oh well.
Another option to see which is harder might be to actually spend a few weeks in learning both the languages online. (I use Memrise). This way you’re familiar but also see which language you learn quicker/ which is easier to adapt to.
Reply 18
Original post by officialmay
I personally found Arabic awfully hard but mandarin seems to be quite compatible for me.

Mandarin is quite interesting and most of the words are familiar to me I don’t know how - you know when you have the feeling that a certain word means something - like it just makes sense. Yeah I’m all in favour of learning mandarin lol

As for Arabic being similar, you might be right. I studied french and they are quite similar actually - the way you add a few letters at the end to change the tense, number or gender.

For me, the words in Arabic were too foreign and just didn’t stick like mandarin did. And addition to that, I did start watching Chinese movies and tv shows to help me improve - maybe that’s what made learning mandarin easier. For Arabic I didn’t do that oh well.

I can’t decide 😫. I’ve watched videos of both of them and I like how Arabic sounds but I can imagine mandarin having the better job opportunities

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