Is two years language study enough?

[Pizzamaster]

Studying Mandarin full time for 1-2 years in China (while working part time) enough to use the language in a work environment? Or possibly to do a Masters?
I just want to gage the approximate level that would be reached. (currently I am close to being able to pass hsk4. My speaking is around the same level but I still have to think before I speak often times, I will be dedicating to speaking more regularly soon though)

[roddy]

Lots of variables, obviously, but I'd say it's enough to hit the ground running and not make a complete mess of things. You won't be in any sense 'finished' learning Chinese. It is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is perhaps the end of the beginning.

[Demonic_Duck]

4 hours ago, Pizzamaster said:

Studying Mandarin full time for 1-2 years in China (while working part time) enough to use the language in a work environment?

 

Yes, if you study reasonably hard.

 

4 hours ago, Pizzamaster said:

Or possibly to do a Masters?

 

Probably.

 

2 hours ago, roddy said:

You won't be in any sense 'finished' learning Chinese.

 

True, but it will be just as true after 20 years as it is after 2 years.

[杰.克]

On 12/16/2020 at 1:17 PM, Pizzamaster said:

Studying Mandarin full time for 1-2 years in China (while working part time) enough to use the language in a work environment? 

 

Yes - to chat with colleagues, make small talk, impress clients, offer surface level value.

No - offer any serious value in large majority of jobs and any technical, or complex subject. 

 

On 12/16/2020 at 1:17 PM, Pizzamaster said:

Or possibly to do a Masters?

 

And study the Masters using Chinese? Practically yes, pass HSK 5 and you can study a masters in China. HSK 5 pass is achievable in 2 years.

However with a health dollop of reality - absolutely NOT. I think it's laughable to think a person could study a subject to Masters level (ie very hard) in a foreign language after 2 years. This is all about university wanting to get more students in and more recruitment money and so not setting the bar too high. (Thinking of the many Chinese students that do masters in UK , their english is almost never good enough, but its a good income stream for unis) It's hard enough doing a masters in your native tongue. 99.9% of people would not be at a lingual ability after 2 years study to comprehend complex theory's, paradigms etc, and the lingual dexterity to write essays poking at nuances or arguing points etc

 

On 12/16/2020 at 1:17 PM, Pizzamaster said:

I just want to gage the approximate level that would be reached.

 

Most people (thinking of a normal distribution graph here) will be a lot less good thank you think or hope. After 2 years you are going to be , in my opinion scraping the lowest level of what you might be able to say is fluent. You will be able to talk on a range of subjects about your life and some current events. But with little depth. You probably wont sound that good.  And you will often stumble on areas where you have no clue what is going on. If you listened to the news or radio, you'd be lost pretty quickly.

 

My general gauge of how long it takes to become good enough at Chinese that language brings significant and consistent, value to your work? At least 5 years.

Study a masters in a subject (ie History or Philosophy) and its in Chinese, and for you to actually study to the depth a masters should be studied too. Probably 10 years.

 

Some people are gonna hate on these time lengths. But it takes a long time. I think there are multiple emotional and societal reasons for why people in my opinion massively under-estimate time lengths, which i wont bore you with or going into. But my advice is, it always takes longer than you might hope.

 

So in summary, no, two years is not enough. Certainly not do it to any credible standard! Show me someone thats studied Chinese for 2 years thats now operating in the language for their job, or studying a masters, and I will show you someone that is barely treading water.

 

 

[Demonic_Duck]

Bear in mind OP is already ~HSK4, not starting from scratch. Though I would say HSK4 is (in terms of time investment) quite a bit closer to zero than it is to professional fluency.

[Flickserve]

23 minutes ago, Demonic_Duck said:

Bear in mind OP is already ~HSK4, not starting from scratch. Though I would say HSK4 is (in terms of time investment) quite a bit closer to zero than it is to professional fluency.

 

Thinking of the reverse, Chinese students who do masters courses overseas have already learnt English for years before embarking on extra exams to test their English ability. HSK 4 is nothing.

[Leslie Frank]

i started studying mando in high school, off and on through my college years. when i graduated i felt confident that i was at least basic conversational level (mind you, canto is my first language, but as an ABC, will never be comparable to natives--although maybe so to the natives who emigrated to other countries at a young age).

 

fast forward to the real world of talking to natives for work:

years, YEARS, of schooling may be a good foundation, but it's NOT gonna get you to a fluency level for the work environment. NOT (don't care what HSK level you're at; i've had interactions with ppl with HSK 5 and 6 and while their character know-how is great, there were problems in verbal communications)

 

however, if you're lucky enough to get into a job that looked for this target language capability, you WILL slowly get to a good enough level of fluency for your work (still NOT something you can brag about unless you have a real talent to progress on your own). this is what happened for me. i wasn't looking for a job as being fluent in mando, but as having basic conversational skills. the gal who did the real work of translating for mando speaking clients resigned. i got all her caseload. i had to sink or swim and chose to not drown. it's tremendously hard to do but do-able; still, takes way more than 2 years, but that's as good a start as anywhere. ?

[pan.kasper]

It's definitely possible, though the value of the knowledge you're getting will be significantly lower than if you were to study it in English or your native language. But diplomma is just as valuable and I believe could be very impressive to your potential future employers. 

From my experience, professors are significantly more lenient to the foreign students when there's just a handful of them in a class full of locals. You might even get away with doing some of your papers in English. It's really not that bad most of the times. As the other guys mentioned above, think of some of the Asian students doing their degrees in Europe or America. While many of them are very proficient users of English, there is still many with only a very basic grasp. Most of them somehow manage to graduate and go back to their countries with a valuable international degree.

 

Also, it's a really great way to learn the language. I did my undergrad in law in London at the age of 19 with knowing little but the basics of English at first but now, 6 years later, I barely ever use my native tongue anymore. I hope it to be the same with Chinese. Nothing will force you to study as hard as when you got to compete with local students who have been using the language their entire lives. 
 

[roddy]

19 hours ago, Demonic_Duck said:

True, but it will be just as true after 20 years as it is after 2 years.

Well, yes. In some 学到老活到老 beard-stroking, there is always something to learn, sense, no, you'll never finish learning Chinese. But for the practical purposes of doing a masters or a job, you'd expect to get to the point where the language learning is far less of a concern. But not after 2 years.

[Jan Finster]

On 12/16/2020 at 2:17 PM, Pizzamaster said:

Studying Mandarin full time for 1-2 years in China (while working part time) enough to use the language in a work environment? Or possibly to do a Masters?
I just want to gage the approximate level that would be reached. (currently I am close to being able to pass hsk4. My speaking is around the same level but I still have to think before I speak often times, I will be dedicating to speaking more regularly soon though)

 

16 hours ago, 杰.克 said:

I think it's laughable to think a person could study a subject to Masters level (ie very hard) in a foreign language after 2 years

 

Does it not depend on the language and the degree? I have seen plenty of Norwegians with literally just a 4 week summer course in German study medicine in Germany. They had to learn the medical terms just like everyone else and passed oral anatomy tests [often after the second attempt] even though they could not really string together a grammatically correct German sentence. After 3-4 years their German was pretty good.

As for Chinese, I wonder how challenging the vocabulary really is in a maths degree. Doing a maths degree in China is probably suicide given the maths level of even the GaoKao, but language is probably not the hard part of it.

[杰.克]

19 hours ago, pan.kasper said:

Also, it's a really great way to learn the language

 

I think this is the crux of it, and a really really good point. Despite me thinking it's laughable (from an academic perspective) anyone could reach good enough Chinese in 2 years to participate in a Masters course to a credible level. I think it's a really fantastic way to acquire the language, and force yourself to reach a much higher level than you were previously.  Your essays and lingual comprehension of lectures and what not will still be far far far below the worst native student in your class. But by gosh, your own language level will have sky rocketed from what it was before.

 

And so in that sense I think it's a really good plan. It's just important people realise this is what is is good for, and not for subject specific academic depth. The uni gets its money from another enrolment, foreign student gets a good experience and improves his language. Everyone wins.

[PerpetualChange]

I've been there. I was in Hong Kong, though.

 

I was awarded a scholarship targeted at international students to study in a Chinese department from 2010-2012, after two years of Chinese study at the college level. As a naive 23 year old, even though it was in Hong Kong I thought it would be like 2 years of Chinese bootcamp where I would have an abundance of Chinese classes as well as language and culture classes. When I got there,  I found something much different, and that something was "not much at all". 

 

HK grad students are like UK grad students - coursework takes a back seat to doing a thesis. Upon recognizing that I had studied Integrated Chinese up through Book 3, with very little practical speaking or listening experience outside of that.  So, I had a foundational level of Chinese, but my Chinese was far from good.

 

Graciously, the Chinese department worked with me so that I could use English to do my thesis and gave me other TA and translation/editing duties for international conferences, etc., instead of what normal grad students did (such as Teaching Assistants). Still, I wanted more, and felt like I wasn't getting wait I... uh... didn't have to pay for... but thought I would get.

 

I audited several classes which were taught in Mandarin, but sat through them mostly clueless and hoping that the teacher would never call on me. Meanwhile I had a tutor, and several language partners. My Chinese improved a lot, but not really because of the class/coursework, and this was partly because the department seemed more interested in my English abilities. Even though they had a scholarship to attract international students, there didn't seem to be much of a plan around what to do with us when we arrived.

 

I would say my Chinese improved like 10% due to my coursework and classes, and 90% due to friends I made outside class. In the end, doing a Master's in Chinese in Hong Kong didn't have much value in and off itself - I prepared myself, I suppose, for doing academic research at a higher level, if I wanted to. 

 

I had a great life experience, didn't have to pay much for it, got to do something like language immersion for a few years, and came out with a degree that is not really practical for me. I'd do it again in a heartbeat, but if I could think about it a bit longer, maybe I'd have found a way to do it that would have dovetailed more easily into a professional that actually exists.