The Army is offering free Rosetta Stone courses for soldiers seeking to learn another language. This is a great program as the more bi-lingual soldiers that we have in our formations, the more effective we’ll be on the ground in far away lands. I’m seriously thinking about signing up for a course (as soon as things settle down a little of course). I’ve a pretty good ear for languages, already speak Italian fairly well but a lack of practice has eroded some of my vocabularly. Here’s the list of languages offered through this program:

Arabic
Chinese (Mandarin)
Danish
Dutch
English (UK)
English (US)
Farsi
French
German
Greek
Hebrew
Hindi
Indonesian
Italian
Japanese
Korean
Latin
Pashto
Polish
Portuguese (BR)
Russian
Spanish (Latin American)
Spanish (Spain)
Swahili
Swedish
Thai
Turkish
Vietnamese
Welsh

Any suggestions? Sgt Hook out.

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Posted by Hook @ 1410 zulu | | Permalink
This post is filed under: General

No Dari? I know Farsi is close, but you’d think we’d get that one!

Comment by Major John — 27 February 2006 @ 1905

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Oh, by the way… Welsh? Latin? Are we going to be intervening in a fight between a Roman Legion and some ancient Welsh? heh heh.

Comment by Major John — 27 February 2006 @ 1907

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I like Italian.. but you got that one. Ummm… always love to hear the French speak.

Comment by Shayna — 27 February 2006 @ 1921

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Isn’t Urdu the language (or one of them) of Pakistan? Seems like a good one to round out the M.E. offerings, along with the Dari that Major John suggested.

Re: Latin. My parents were both required to take Latin in high school. My Mom’s favorite line about that experience was …
Latin is a dead language, as dead as it can be.
First it killed the Romans, and now it’s killing Me!

Comment by Barb — 27 February 2006 @ 2044

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I would take Latin… but I need to learn English first.

Comment by Shelleigh (aka Pie Shell) — 27 February 2006 @ 2050

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Hook…I’m enrolled in the Russian course and IT’S AWESOME! Yeah, I probably need to hit it on a daily or every other day basis, but it gets two thumbs up. Very impressive!

Barb…does it mean that I’m old since I took Latin in high school?

See you on the high ground!

MajorDad1984

Comment by MajorDad1984 — 27 February 2006 @ 2334

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I’m actually leaning towards the Russian course. Something tells me it might come in handy a few years down the road.

Comment by Hook — 28 February 2006 @ 0017

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Jerseyspeak. Yo!!

Comment by Jim - PRS — 28 February 2006 @ 0134

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Chinese. I think we’re in trouble there…

Comment by Bou — 1 March 2006 @ 0407

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I wouldn’t want to try Chinese as a first non-Latin alphabet language. Because the writing is pictograms instead of letters, one can’t use reading the written language to drive verbal learning. (I was not successful with Mandarin even after having mastered Hebrew, German and British, and acquiring a smattering of Dutch and Spanish.) After having mastered Italian, any of the Romance languages will come fairly easily, but I don’t see how that will benefit you, career-wise.

If I had the opportunity you’re being given, I’d go for either Russian, Arabic or Farsi, depending on what you think your next assignment will be. Just remember that the Arabs and the Persians despise each other, and Farsi is an Indo-European language, whereas Arabic is Semitic, so the one won’t help if you end up in the other country. Then Pashto after Arabic, I’d think, because isn’t it written with Arabic letters, as Urdu is? And there are Pashtuns on both sides of the Pakistan/Afghanistan border (all cousins, in fact, which is why the Taliban and Al Qaeda hang out there, as I understand it), in fact I b’lieve Pashtuns are the largest tribe on the Afghan side.

Good luck, sir, and happy learning!

Comment by trailing wife — 2 March 2006 @ 0405

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I don’t need the “Jersey Speak”….I grew up there. I suppose I’m a 3/3 native!

See you on the high ground or Exit 142!

MajorDad1984

Comment by MajorDad1984 — 2 March 2006 @ 1236

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