The School of Foreign Studies (SFS) of Xi’an Jiaotong University (XJTU) was established in 1897, just one year after the university was founded in Shanghai as Nan Yang College, under the name of the Department of Western Languages.

At present, SFS offers 3 undergraduate programs: English (including bilingual majors of English & German, English & French, and English & Russian), Japanese, and French. SFS is authorized to offer master’s degree in Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics, English Language and Literature, Japanese Language and Literature, French Language and Literature, as well as for Master of Translation and Interpreting (MTI) program (English, Japanese). In 2013, SFS initiated a Ph.D. program in Systemics of Language and Culture. SFS also offers a diverse range of foreign-languages-related courses to undergraduate and graduate students of other majors at XJTU.

The departments and institutions of SFS include: the English Department, the Japanese Department, the French Department, the German Department, the Russian Department, the College English Teaching Center, the Postgraduate English Teaching Center, the Foreign Languages Research Center, the MTI Education Center, the Silk Road Combined Center of European Studies (SRCCES), the Center of Japanese Studies, the Center of Cross-Cultural Studies, the Center of Translation and Interpreting, and other support institutions such as the Teaching Experiment Center and the Center for International Language Tests.

Over 540 students currently study in SFS, among which more than 430 are undergraduates and 110 are postgraduates. The faculty and staff total about 210, including 15 professors and 71 associate professors. Each year, about 30 experts and teachers from other countries would work at SFS, and dozens of visiting professors and part-time professors come to visit or teach.

SFS boasts a group of brilliant and talented faculty who are involved in teaching and are actively engaged in a wide range of research fields in linguistics, literature and international relations, covering discourse analysis, second language acquisition and foreign language teaching, fuzzy linguistics, translation studies, ESP, lexicography, foreign literature, etc. Their work has been supported by various research funds, including funding from the National Social Science Foundation and the Shaanxi Social Science Foundation. Research articles are often published in distinguished international journals, and specialized academic books are often published by leading academic presses.

SFS has established ties to 16 well-known universities in the United States, Japan, Germany, France, Australia, and other countries, and has implemented extensive exchange and cooperation programs. Each year, over 50 students and teachers go abroad for studying or participating in research, and more than 10 international scholars are invited for presenting lectures at XJTU.

SFS is located in the Shaw Building, which has classrooms equipped with advanced recording and multimedia systems, and a simultaneous interpretation training system. Other specialized facilities within the building include a professional recording studio, an FM radio broadcasting station, and rich online resources for language learning. The SFS library has amassed a collection of more than 30,000 volumes of books and dozens of academic journals, providing plentiful resources for foreign language teaching and research.