Which language should I learn..Mandarin Chinese or Spanish?
I'm a pre-med student and I plan to do a minor in a foreign language. I know english and arabic already, but I still want to learn another language. I'm confused which language to pick since I want to learn both spanish and chinese so badly. I have taken Spanish in high school (for 4 years), but I've never taken chinese (since it wasn't offered). Spanish was easy to pick up, but there was so much dreadful conjugating, and I found it somewhat boring at times.
I know that the number of spanish speaking people in the U.S. is rising, and it would be beneficial to learn spanish fluently (especially if I do become a doctor). They even offer a course called Medical Spanish at my college. But, there are ~845 million chinese speakers! and only ~329 million spanish speakers. Chinese seems so much more interesting and on the rise to dominate. Which should I pick?
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You should take Spanish. Chinese is very difficult, you will not be able to learn much in a semester or two. Since you took Spanish in high school already, you should go for Spanish. I’m sure you did not learned much in High school, because it’s very normal for students not to pick it up inn such learning environment.
Spanish. Why? Because most Chinese people speak English, while most Spanish-speakers don’t speak English. If you decide to work in China then learn Chinese but other wise i’d say Espagnol.
Practically speaking, Spanish would be far more useful if you were to practice medicine in the United States. Although the world’s Chinese speakers far outnumber the world’s Spanish speakers, the United States’ Spanish speakers far outnumber it’s Chinese speakers.
However, if you’re looking to "stand out" from other med school applicants or doctors, Chinese might be the way to go, especially if you’re already proficient in Spanish. Bilingual English/Spanish speakers are not all that difficult to come by.
As for difficulty, Chinese is without a doubt more difficult than Spanish. But if you plan to go to med school and become a doctor, this should not even be a factor and you should not let its difficulty scare you off. As hard as it is, it’s actually a lot of fun to learn.If you can learn Arabic, you can most likely learn Chinese too.
Also, if for some reason you don’t go to med school, a knowledge of Chinese would be very beneficial to you as a job applicant, especially in the business world.