Cambridge Asian and Middle Eastern Studies Interview Questions and Mock Interviews

Here are two invented English versions of the same short line from an imagined poem in a language you do not read. Version A: "The wind has no house, so it calls at every door." Version B: "Homeless, the breeze visits all." What does each version seem to value? What might each translator have decided to give up, and what would you ask someone who could read the original line?

A student reads a foundational religious story in the same way they would read a novel, looking at its characters, plot and style. One person says this misses what the story is for. Another says it is the only sensible way for a scholar to read it. Which view do you find stronger, and could both be partly right?

A friend says that after three months with a language app they know a language. A university degree in a language such as Chinese, Japanese or Arabic is spread over several years. What might it mean to know a language, and what could explain the gap between your friend's claim and the length of the degree?

People often use labels such as East Asia or the Middle East to group countries together. Argue that these labels are useful to a student of the region, then argue that they are misleading. From whose point of view might a place be called East or Middle, and which of your two arguments is stronger?

Imagine one writing system in which most symbols stand for whole words or meaningful parts of words, and another in which each symbol stands for a single sound. A student says the second kind is simply better because it is easier to learn. Defend that claim, then challenge it.

Here are two invented pilgrimages. In the first, walkers in a mountain region of Asia spend three weeks climbing to a hilltop shrine, and each carries a stone to add to a pile at the top. In the second, travellers in the Middle East go each year by boat along a river to the tomb of a saint, where they camp for three days and share meals. Someone argues that it is pointless to compare them, because the societies behind them are so different. Defend this position, and then say what a careful comparison could still reveal.

Imagine two neighbouring countries in Asia whose school textbooks tell different stories about the same border war. One student says a historian's job is to find the one true account. Another says the job is to explain why there are two accounts. Which position is stronger, and are they really opposed?

Here is an invented museum label. "Bronze vessel with a lid. Bought from a dealer. Said to come from a merchant's house. Decoration: lions among clouds. Use unknown." What can you reasonably say about the object from the label alone? What can you not say, and what evidence would you look for to find out more?

A traveller writes that the market of a trading city sold goods from twelve different lands, and that its people were generous to every stranger. What can a source like this show a historian, and what can it not show? What other evidence would help you decide how far to trust it?

Two languages share many words for cloth, spices and coins, but their words for body parts, numbers and family members are quite different. What might explain this? What further evidence would help you choose between the explanations?

A stone slab set up by a ruler says that he defeated every enemy in his lands and made his people happy. One historian treats it as a record of events. Another says it is propaganda and tells us only what the ruler wanted people to believe. What could the slab still show, even if the second historian is right? What other evidence would help you decide between them?

A village has a song, passed down through many generations, which says its people came long ago from a high mountain valley. How could you decide whether the song is evidence of a real migration? What might the song be good evidence of, even if no migration took place?

Suppose a society with a large body of poetry, law and storytelling had never developed writing and had relied on memory and speech alone. What would we know less about, what could still survive, and what would change for the people themselves?

Suppose that an overland trade route linking East Asia and the Middle East had never been used. Which changes would you expect, and which would be hardest to detect in the evidence? Where would you look first?

Suppose that for a long time the main books describing Britain to a wide public had been written by visitors from Asian and Middle Eastern societies, and British readers knew their own country largely through those books. How might those books differ from the ones British writers produce about themselves, and how might British readers have reacted?

Some languages, including Japanese and Korean, build levels of politeness into the endings of verbs, so that speakers must choose a level every time they speak. Suppose English worked this way. How might introducing yourself to a new teacher differ, what might stay the same, and what would this suggest about the link between language and social life?

Think of a book, film, podcast or documentary about Asia or the Middle East that changed your mind about something. What did you think before, what do you think now, and what would you ask its author or maker?

Think of something you have read about Asia, the Middle East or their languages that you found hard to understand. Where exactly did your understanding break down, and what did you do about it?

Choose a language you would like to study from scratch. What draws you to it, and how could you test whether that interest would last through years of hard, often repetitive work?

Is there an idea from another subject you study, such as history, literature, religion, geography or maths, that has changed how you read about Asia or the Middle East? Explain the idea and how it helps.

Imagine a museum in Britain that holds objects from Asia and the Middle East. Some were bought fairly, some were given, and some were taken during wars. Some people say all of them should be returned, others that they are best kept where many people can see them. How would you decide, and would you treat every object the same way?

A British novelist writes a book set in a Middle Eastern city, partly in the voice of a local character. What responsibilities does the author have? Could a reader from that city be right to object, and could they be wrong?

A researcher wants to record a festival held by a small community. Some members agree to be filmed. Others object because the festival is private. Whose view should decide, and what could the researcher do to respect both sides?

You are studying a religious tradition that is not your own. A member of that tradition tells you that your essay describes it in a way no believer would recognise. How should you weigh their view against the evidence you have used, and what, if anything, would change in your essay?