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Language Requirements

Posted: Wed Feb 15, 2012 4:29 pm
by sywisy
In the past I've heard several times of people talking about how knowing a foreign language is important in math grad admissions.

A few of my applications (roughly 3/14) asked whether I knew a foreign language. I've now been accepted to 4 pretty competitive institutions and none of them mention anything about having to know a foreign language. So is the foreign language requirement (like German, Chinese, Russian, not Spanish!) only a few select institutions? Or am I looking at outliers?

Re: Language Requirements

Posted: Wed Feb 15, 2012 8:05 pm
by kuz
Some universities require you to pass a test in one or two languages (usually French, German, Russian, or maybe Chinese) to show that you can read maths papers in that language - which is probably fair enough, considering I've twice already had to read a paper in French because there was no English translation. That's the only reason I could imagine that they care about how fluent you are in other languages.

Re: Language Requirements

Posted: Wed Feb 15, 2012 10:02 pm
by wine in coffee cups
The questions may have just been part of the general graduate school application. None of the departments I applied to have a language requirement, but I was asked about foreign language proficiency on most applications anyway.

Re: Language Requirements

Posted: Wed Mar 21, 2012 2:16 pm
by kiurys
I remember years ago when I was doing my undergrad, I used to read about PhD programs in math and always remember reading about this foreign language requirement of French, Russian, and German (if I remember correctly).

Now that I have applied to PhD programs myself I was surprised how almost all departments dont have this requirement...I wonder why? Although Im certainly happy about it. I also remember recently seeing one department (which I dont remember which one is it) that includes Spanish in the list of languages...

Re: Language Requirements

Posted: Thu Mar 22, 2012 3:01 am
by ANDS
From what I've heard, is that even if there is this requirement the exam is basically: Here is a dictionary, translate this paper.

Re: Language Requirements

Posted: Thu Mar 22, 2012 4:14 am
by owlpride
Now that I have applied to PhD programs myself I was surprised how almost all departments dont have this requirement...I wonder why?
Foreign languages used to be more important because much math was published in French or German or Russian. Nowadays, most math is published in English so that's no longer necessary.

However, from what I hear, you do absolutely want to be able to read French if you go into algebraic geometry...

Re: Language Requirements

Posted: Fri Mar 23, 2012 10:41 pm
by Topoltergeist
owlpride wrote: However, from what I hear, you do absolutely want to be able to read French if you go into algebraic geometry...
If you go into Tropical Geometry, do you think Portuguese would also be a must? :lol:

Also, at UW I think they allow you to count a Computer Language, like JAVA or C++, as a foreign language.