Actual usefulness of fluency in Mandarin?

[Sanglunaria]

I've been told by a countless number of people that the fact that I am fluent in Mandarin Chinese means I will be very marketable when I'm looking for a job. However, I have always questioned the truthfulness of this claim because every time I attend a job fair hosted by my university, none of the company representatives never seem to notice the "Fluent in Mandarin Chinese" on my resume. There have been several instances where I'm talking to a company representative and he'll be like, "Oh wow! You're fluent in Chinese! You should definitely go check out the CIA and NSA booths if you haven't already!" ... only to go to the CIA and NSA booths and have no comment whatsoever made on my fluency (yes, I am a natural born US citizen, if you're about to ask).

So, smogon, my question to you isn't so much what I can do to help my personal situation, but just generally speaking: What are your own experiences (assuming you are fluent in the language in question) on this situation? How useful do you think fluency in Mandarin Chinese is? And just for fun, what other languages do you think are particularly useful?

 

[Phantom_IV]

Fluency in Mandarin isn't something that attracts blanket appreciation like graduating from Harvard. However, that's not to say that it's not immensely useful in the workplace. When your company is looking for representatives to meet with a Chinese firm, you'll be in consideration. When you're looking for a job with a firm, your resume might get an extra look because they need want people who can negotiate with their foreign partners.

Essentially, keep up your skills and it'll pay off later on.

Curiously, are you Asian? If you're Chinese and your resume says you speak Chinese it's less impressive than if you're Caucasian.

There's no language that will be more useful than Mandarin going forward. China's on the rise and is full of business opportunities. Another notable language to speak is Spanish, but Spanish-speaking countries aren't going to be as influential as China during our lifetimes.

 

[mtr]

I think it's useful to have, but not the be-all, end-all thing that some people make it out to be. Honestly, most educated people in China (the people you would be working with) will know English. However, keep it up because it makes you a well-rounded applicant, and who knows: it could come in handy.

 

[McGrrr]

Being able to network in both English and Mandarin will be a huge benefit in years to come. Although many Chinese are fluent in English, their skill-sets tend to be different from Westerners. Chinese education focuses on technical skills, but Westerners are traditionally more creative.

 

[cantab]

I don't doubt that it's useful in some sense, but it's probably not the most useful language to have. The reason being that while a lot of people speak Mandarin, most of those people live in China. Whereas something like Spanish or Urdu is more widely spoken. (I would expect in my own job fluency in Urdu, Arabic, or other south Asian languages would be rather more useful than fluency in Mandarin, simply because of the ethnicity of our usual clientele. Unfortunately I only speak English.)

If you want to work in China, then it's obviously very useful. But besides that, I'm not sure it counts for more than any other language, and probably less than some.

 

[Firestorm]

If I knew Mandarin I'd be able to apply to a lot more jobs. Most of the international opportunities in my school's Co-op database like us to be fluent in both English and Mandarin or Cantonese. You can get some nice teaching position overseas. The area I live in also has a high percentage of Chinese immigrants making the language a huge asset for any job that deals with people.

Oh and when China takes over the world I'm sure it'll be useful to know.

 

[frogbandit]

Im in the complete opposite boat as you. Im full-blood Chinese, and my parents are fluent in Mandarin, but I wasnt raised in China so I never really learned. All I was able to do is pick up a few phrases here and there when my parents talked. My parebts sent me to a language class a few years ago, but I didn't really like it and never learned much (the class was mostly second graders anyways) Now I'm quite busy in high school and am taking spanish, which I find to be more interesting and unique (more value for colleges too) My parents still urge me to learn chinese, except in an advanced class (more people my age) but I think it takes too much time and Ill feel like a complete idiot because I barely know any Mandarin. Parents and relatives and such keep saying Chinese will be SO important in the future (mandarin of course) because China is a growing power and it would help in job applications and generally just social life. But at least I can chat with my gardener :p

 

[Sanglunaria]

Im in the complete opposite boat as you. Im full-blood Chinese, and my parents are fluent in Mandarin, but I wasnt raised in China so I never really learned. All I was able to do is pick up a few phrases here and there when my parents talked. My parebts sent me to a language class a few years ago, but I didn't really like it and never learned much (the class was mostly second graders anyways) Now I'm quite busy in high school and am taking spanish, which I find to be more interesting and unique (more value for colleges too) My parents still urge me to learn chinese, except in an advanced class (more people my age) but I think it takes too much time and Ill feel like a complete idiot because I barely know any Mandarin. Parents and relatives and such keep saying Chinese will be SO important in the future (mandarin of course) because China is a growing power and it would help in job applications and generally just social life. But at least I can chat with my gardener :p

Haha, I was forced to go to Chinese school for a few years when I was a kid, and my parents would only speak to me in Chinese... which is really the only reason why I'm able to speak it so well. They say that I ruined my younger brother's Chinese because I spoke too much English to him when he was little.

 

[YounhaJjang]

Mandarin is the second most prevalent language in the world, yet more than 75 percent of mandarin speakers speak english. Case Closed.

 

[Terminator]

Mandarin is the second most prevalent language in the world, yet more than 75 percent of mandarin speakers speak english. Case Closed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_English-speaking_population

Check China. I don't know where you got your statistics from.

 

[unlucky_psyduck]

Divide by 100 and you get kind of close, right?