Languages through arts

racl96

Hi, I have international languages number one on my CAO but after a few disastrous exams there's a chance I won't get the points. I have French and Spanish through arts as my second choice and was wondering what the difference between these two courses is? I know the erasmus is guaranteed with International Languages but is there anything else I would miss out on if I ended up in straight arts? Any information would be great, thanks.

Canard

The only difference is the two core modules in first year that you'd miss out on (which are absolutely awful, so don't worry) and then the one in second year (which is better) and one in final year (which I haven't done yet). You also get to do the second/final year modules instead of a literature module in each language, which can be quite nice because no one likes literature. :pac:

It's definitely better being in the course though because you can make friends much more easily, and above all else the coordinators are excellent and always ready to help you out (which you will probably need at some point in the 4 years!). But being in arts wouldn't be the end of the world by any means.

Good luck and hope you get the course!

racl96

Canard wrote: »

The only difference is the two core modules in first year that you'd miss out on (which are absolutely awful, so don't worry) and then the one in second year (which is better) and one in final year (which I haven't done yet). You also get to do the second/final year modules instead of a literature module in each language, which can be quite nice because no one likes literature. :pac:

It's definitely better being in the course though because you can make friends much more easily, and above all else the coordinators are excellent and always ready to help you out (which you will probably need at some point in the 4 years!). But being in arts wouldn't be the end of the world by any means.

Good luck and hope you get the course!

Thanks so much that really helps! It looks like a great course so fingers crossed I've done enough to get it, hoping the points don't jump too much! Thanks again.

literatefarmer

Whether the two core modules are ''absolutely awful'' is a matter of opinion - I get the impression that a lot of people went into that course under the false belief that the IML course was based primarily around language rather than literature,, something which will never be the case in an NUI institution. The whole point of the Shaping of Europe is to add a bit of cultural and intellectual history as a context, whether it succeeds in doing so is another matter however - perhaps history should be left to the historians or to universities with a long tradition of offering courses in European studies i.e. TCD and UL.

Canard

literatefarmer wrote: »

Whether the two core modules are ''absolutely awful'' is a matter of opinion - I get the impression that a lot of people went into that course under the false belief that the IML course was based primarily around language rather than literature,, something which will never be the case in an NUI institution. The whole point of the Shaping of Europe is to add a bit of cultural and intellectual history as a context, whether it succeeds in doing so is another matter however - perhaps history should be left to the historians or to universities with a long tradition of offering courses in European studies i.e. TCD and UL.

Given that not one single person I've spoken to has ever had a good word to say about them, I think they are quite definitely awful. You weren't in them so you can't even argue against that -- it's not "history" most of the time, it was 13th century feminist philosophy, monads (basically learning about atoms or something in the context of 16th century philosophy), we had to learn about feminist frameworks for arguing against the patriarchy using the bible. That was just one of the modules. Either way, the fact remains that the OP is interested in French and Spanish, and not history.

Sam the Sham

literatefarmer does have a point: a great many students don't realise that the so-called "language" degrees that they are choosing are really degrees in the language and culture(s), particularly literary culture(s) that are expressed in that language. Students often enter these degrees thinking that they will involve nothing but instruction in the language, so that they'd come out able to speak just as ignorantly in two (or more) languages as they could in English before they started university. But most of these degrees assume you already have a sound knowledge of the language(s).

This mismatch between student expectations and the realities of the degrees explain a lot about courses that "nobody has a good thing to say about." It is possible for a course to be quite good and for students to universally hate it for no other reason than that they don't want to (and didn't expect to have to) do a course of that sort...

Note: I'm not saying that the IML compulsory 1st-year courses are good. Just that everyone hating them doesn't necessarily mean they are bad.

TL;DR: Carefully read the descriptions of the degrees you think you'd like to apply for. Even if they are too long

Canard

Hmm, I could argue the point all day really, but it's irrelevant. All that's advised for IML is a HC3 in the advanced language and they expect most people to be doing a beginner's one, with the advanced language being at CEFR level B1 by the end of first year -- hardly a sound enough level to read many books in if you even get to that level by then. I've quite enjoyed some of the literature modules I've had to do, and I even enjoyed the European history module this year, it's nothing to do with being stubborn. It's extremely tedious, and doesn't really deepen anyone's knowledge of any culture because by the nature of the course it can't favourite any one language over the other.

Anyway, I was just giving the OP advice as someone who did both modules and knows that most people didn't like them, so they probably wouldn't either. The poster who thanked my post is in the year below me and had similar sentiments, fwiw.