Is it possible to learn Danish in Denmark and study in Danish university (undergraduate) after?

Can I study 2 languages at university and learn one extra from scratch?

• Hi everyone, I love modern foreign languages and they are definitely where my life is heading towards. I've studied German and French at GCSE and continued them both in A-Level, which is great! However, I've always aspired to learn Spanish as well, since it's such a widely spoken language in the world today. Sadly, my school didn't offer Spanish, but it was ok as I could focus on my French and German. I'm definitely planning to continue both French and German into university, but I was wondering if it would be possible to learn Spanish with the university totally from scratch. I know there are places with great language courses (St. Andrews is one if I remember correctly), so if this is possible then it'd be absolutely fantastic! I've got a really good head for languages and plenty of motivation for learning them, so learning a third language is definitely something to consider. But can a university offer what I want - French, German, and then Spanish from scratch? (Going to a university in Europe is an option, should it matter!)

• Answer:

  I really admire your enthusiasm and if I had my time over again I would do the same thing. My school wouldn't let me do both French and German at A level, said I had to choose between them - how stupid is that. I think you should find learning Spanish fairly easy if you already have good French. According to the Institute of Linguists, it is the easiest foreign language for someone whose first language is English to learn. (Though a Spanish person once got very cross with me when I said that and assured me it is actually really difficult.) One thing that occurs to me is that all universities now have self-study language centres, so you should be allowed to study any language you want in your own time in there, even if you're not doing it as a formal part of the course. But obviously it would be better if you could study it formally. You need to study the websites of all the universities you are interested in to see what language combinations they offer. If you are interested in a career in translation, Heriot-Watt in Edinburgh is very good for that, I think it offers courses specifically to prepare you for that. The other outstanding place for translation is at Westminster in London. If you are more interested in literature and a more traditional academic approach to the study of language, you would be better at an older university. EDIT Okay, I've looked at the St Andrews website (www.st-andrews.ac.uk) and they do offer Spanish from scratch, and they do offer French-German-Spanish in one degree, but you will need to study the info carefully to work out whether the third language is offered from scratch in any particular combination. They seem to offer masses of different combinations so the chances seem high. The way you get to the languages dept is to click on Subjects at the top of the home page and then click on the name of one of your languages.