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I have a sibling who is a Mandarin linguist, the job opportunities have been excellent but mostly with government.
It is interesting to note that only about half of China's population even knows Mandarin. Cantonese is the language spoken most often in Hong Kong where much of Chinese business is located.
Something interesting is that many Cantonese speakers can understand Mandarin, but not the other way around.
That's very typical of millennials who may hold college degrees in science but chose not to expand their careers because the world today evolves too quickly but one thing that hasn't change is communication skills are always in demand.
Being born and raised in China doesn't necessarily guarantee that you'll be able to read and write the characters. China is a big place, and most of it I'd say are poor areas where access to education is not readily accessible. My grandma lived in China for half her life, but grew up in extreme poverty...not to mention that women back then were pushed into other things rather than education. She can speak Cantonese and Mandarin, but her reading and writing is very limited.
Trust me, you will forget Chinese characters it you don't study or read everyday.
My Chinese teacher when I was in college (She learned Chinese on her 20s) says she has to study constantly otherwise she might forget many of them.
I think the issue is that many people are promoting the study of Chinese as a practical 'leg up' in future employability. In short, that speaking and writing/reading Mandarin will be necessary to function in the international and even the American/Western workplace, at least in part. This is based on the increased interaction between Chinese and Western companies.
However, most companies, from any country in the world, prefer to do business with foreigners in English.
Yes, if you want to move to Germany to work for a German company, learn German. If you want to move to China, learn Chinese. But even if you want to work for a Chinese company with offices in the United States, or any country outside of China, then English will be your greatest asset, linguisically.
On the other hand, I am a big proponent of multi-lingualism and learning languages for self-enrichment and as a cognitive exercise. But in this case, learn any language you want whether Mandarin, Tagalog, Albanian, French, Jamaican Patois, etc.
Trust me, you will forget Chinese characters it you don't study or read everyday.
My Chinese teacher when I was in college (She learned Chinese on her 20s) says she has to study constantly otherwise she might forget many of them.
I am Chinese. I know full well what it takes to maintain proficiency. That being said, there's also traditional and simplified. Chinese people who grew up learning traditional will not recognize some of the simplified characters.
I have heard that learning a difficult language is "good" for the brain, although I forget the specifics.
Learning a language, especially at a young age, increases the brain's plasticity and adaptability to other languages. Small children who are raised bi- or multi-lingually learn that there is more than one way to view the world, more than one way to categorize real-world phenomena. Their minds increase their ability to absorb new types of information, especially new languages, and to view the world from different perspectives. When one learns a new language, at least to some extent one catches a glimpse of a different world view; the more alien the language (i.e. beyond European, or Indo-European), the more that is true. That, IME, is enriching.
Last edited by Ruth4Truth; 09-22-2016 at 01:40 PM..
I don't see a problem with wanting to learn any new thing. Learning of languages is something that should be pushed more in the States. I think it would be awesome to be able to speak Mandarin. I think it would be awesome to speak Korean, Spanish, French, German, Russian, Finnish, and any other languages out there. For many nations this is a normal thing. Many people around here speak Spanish and English. Some speak a third language. We have some friends that transferred to Italy for three years. When they came back this summer they were speaking English, Spanish, and Italian. They have two young kids that now speak three languages.
Yes!!! And this is EXACTLY why I have put my children in a Chinese immersion school. THIS!
Actually It is so important to me and my children's future, that my husband and I are don't even live in the same state because there are no mandarin schools in Dallas-where he took a job last year.
How old is your child? My daughter is in 2nd grade and I have her in the Mandarin immersion program at her elementary school. Last year was the first year of the immersion program. The class as a whole did great considering they basically learned two years in one.
I don't see a problem with wanting to learn any new thing. Learning of languages is something that should be pushed more in the States. I think it would be awesome to be able to speak Mandarin. I think it would be awesome to speak Korean, Spanish, French, German, Russian, Finnish, and any other languages out there. For many nations this is a normal thing. Many people around here speak Spanish and English. Some speak a third language. We have some friends that transferred to Italy for three years. When they came back this summer they were speaking English, Spanish, and Italian. They have two young kids that now speak three languages.
Good point. In Holland, it's required to study French, German and English in school. All Dutch who have been through their own school system know 4 languages. The problem in the US is that too many Americans (those, whose immigrant roots go back too far for them to have experienced a second language in the home), tend to take for granted that the world will learn English, so they don't see the value of learning another language.
However, in many parts of the world, it's common to grow up multi-lingual. There are many regions where several languages/nationalities converge, and people naturally grow up speaking all the languages in their environment. People who are raised in mono-lingual countries may have trouble understanding that.
Learning Japanese was supposed to be the wave of the future, back in the 80's, "so you can get a good job". Japan's economy has been a shambles for decades and nobody talks about learning Japanese anymore.
But if learning Mandarin can help to get your takeout order filled faster, go for it!
No, it won't: they speak Cantonese over here. Should help plenty when I'm having suits made in Hong Kong, though: how do you say, "Oooooohh: you FAT!" in Cantonese?
Back in the 1980s, some pals and I learned basic Russian since we were standing nose-to-nose with those people for forty years prior in the Cold War. I did it to hit on their women, who are indeed fine to look at.
In the 1990s, we feared the Chinese after the Russians collapsed. That lasted into the 2000s. I'm more afraid of Indians speaking Tamil, Hindi, or Marathi, personally. Though I've seldom-to-never heard any of them try and wrap me over the head with it here in America, either.
Nor have my Russian girlfriends had much use for my use of the language: one said, quote, "your Russian is all (fogged) up, no one actually talks like that!" So ended that lesson.
Really, across the decades, I've found best use of my linguistic talents to be Spanish, out here on the West Coast. Not exactly necessary, but helps when figuring out what the help is saying and/or ordering at various restaurants. I'm passable at understanding and speaking it.
We're waaaaay ahead of the game speaking fluent English, from a global commerce perspective. Run with it, let them adjust instead.
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