The predecessor of the School of Foreign Language of Shanxi University is the English Literature Faculty of Arts Department of Shanxi Grand School established in 1919. After over 90 years of development, the school has got 6 Bachelor's degree programs of English Language and Literature, Japanese Language and Literature, French Language and Literature, Russian Language and Literature, German Language and Literature and Translation. The school had established its first secondary discipline entitled for conferring a Master's degree in English Language and Literature as early as 1984, and then added three more disciplines entitled for conferring a Master's degree in Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics, Japanese Language and Literature and French Language and Literature successively. Among which, Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics is a key discipline at the provincial level.

The primary discipline entitled for conferring a Master's degree in Foreign Languages and Literatures was approved with the Academic Degrees Committee of Shanxi Province's review and approval of the Academic Degrees Committee under the State Council in 2010, and a Master’s degree program of Translation was added in the same year. The school successfully applied for an out of catalogue secondary discipline for conferring a Doctorate in Verbal Communications, and received approval in 2011. It added a Bachelor’s degree program of Translation in 2012 with the Shanxi Provincial Education Department’s review as well as the Ministry of Education’s filing and approval.

The school has a secondary research institute for Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics, a Foreign Languages Research Institute of Shanxi University as well as research laboratories for Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics, British and American Literature, Translation, Comparison between Chinese and Foreign Language and Culture, and University Foreign Language Teaching.

The school also coordinates a Training Center for the Foreign Language Examinations of Shanxi University and the Foreign Language Training Department for People Going Abroad in Shanxi Province. It holds TOEFL, GRE, BEC, JLPT, NAETI, WSK, CATTI, BFT and HSK.

Lecturers of the school's various majors have conducted a great number of related professional studies, and have achieved substantial results. They have published 271 papers in well-known Chinese and international academic journals as well as 34 monographs and teaching materials, they received 21 awards at the provincial and ministry level and above, and have conducted 5 projects funded by the National Social Science Fund and the Ministry of Education's Youth Fund of Humanities and Social Sciences, along with completing 68 provincial and ministry level projects.

The school boasts of excellent teaching conditions, as it is in possession of 2 teaching buildings, which cover a teaching area of 3,558.3 square meters and a scientific research area of 687.8 square meters. Originally, it had one computer room, six language laboratories and five multimedia classrooms. It actively raised funds and built two digital language laboratories, one simultaneous interpretation and translation laboratory and seven multimedia classrooms in 2011, and those additional laboratories cover a total area of around 1,500 square meters .

The school has one set of satellite television receiving and central control systems, while the Information Center received over 50,000 books and audio-visual materials, as well as more than 90 kinds of Chinese and foreign periodicals, and the entire school is covered by a campus network.

The school has outstanding teaching force, and it has 138 teaching and administrative staff members, including 5 professors, 29 associate professors, 2 doctoral advisors and 19 postgraduate advisors. 16 lecturers have received a doctorate and 15 lecturers are studying for a doctorate. Translator and translation theorists Mr. Chang Feng, Mr. Nie Chongxin, Mr. Peng Fumin and Mr. Gao Jian all had given lectures here for a long period of time, and the excellent teaching and research traditions have been passed down. The school engaged Mr. Ji Chaozhu, Former UN Under-Secretary-General and senior diplomatist as Honorary Dean, and hired more than 10 well-known Chinese scholars as visiting professors and part-time professors, such as Gu Riguo, Xu Shenghuan and He Ziran. Different majors all have foreign experts for teaching.

The school has been attaching great importance to the strengthening of its external academic exchanges, it has carried out many academic exchanges with the Beijing Foreign Studies University, the Shanghai International Studies University and other well-known universities in China, and has built up an academic exchange mechanism with a number of overseas universities, such as Pfeiffer University in North Carolina, Aston University in the UK, Rikkyo University in Japan, Tokyo International University, Yokohama National University, and the Sydney University of Technology.

After over 90 years of development, together with its strengths, the School of Foreign Language has become a base for development of outstanding interdisciplinary talents in the province of Shanxi, which integrates the functions of foreign language teaching, scientific research and social services. It plays an increasingly important role in Shanxi’s opening to the outside world and economic construction.