Arabic, Korean and Chinese most popular language courses at U.S. colleges

Arabic, Korean and Chinese most popular language courses at U.S. colleges.

Student enrollment in Arabic, Korean and Chinese classes is showing the fastest growth among foreign language courses at U.S. colleges, even though Spanish remains the most popular by a huge margin, a new study shows.

The survey of more than 2,500 colleges and universities by the Modern Language Assn., or MLA, found that enrollment in Arabic surged by 46% between 2006 and 2009. More U.S. college students are studying Arabic than Russian, a change that officials say reflects a shift of interest from Cold War concerns to current issues involving the Middle East and terrorism.

The study of Arabic by young Americans started to show significant growth immediately after the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001, and its enrollment has tripled since then, said Rosemary G. Feal, the MLA's executive director.

"It's a response to what's going on in the world," she said, noting that the same holds true for a recent increase in Chinese and Korean courses and such lesser studied languages as Hindi and Punjabi.

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