Southwest Jiaotong University has achieved four consecutive top ranks among Sichuan universities in the Rankings of Undergraduate Education in China (version published by the WUHAN University) during the period of 2017 to 2021. And such ranking, nowadays, is one of the most influential evaluation forms for Chinese university and its disciplines.
In 2021, with its salient specialty and achievement in terms of education, research and development, the translation major of Southwest Jiaotong University is authorized as the “national-level first-class undergraduate major” by the Ministry of Education of the People’s Republic of China and becomes one of the two first-class undergraduate majors in the School of Foreign Languages.
The Department of Translation invariably puts the education and cultivation of students first. It actively unfolds reform in education and establishes series of excellent coursed to promote educational quality. For instance, the “Workplace English” course presided by Professor Yang Anwen was selected as the national-level MOOCs, and on the basis of talent cultivation with school characteristics the “International Project Contracting and management practice English” by associate Professor Dai Ruoyu rated as the provincial first-class curriculum in 2020 as well as “English listening and translation”,” alternative interpreting ” and “Argumentative Writing in English” as the school-level first-class curriculum.
Adhering to the tradition of “mutual benefit between teaching and research”, the department of translation has laid solid scientific and research foundation for talent cultivation. In recent two years, Professor Yu Senling has presided over projects, including the ongoing sub-project called “Oral History of Chinese Language and the Spread of Chinese Culture in North America and Oceania by World Sinologists" for Major Bidding Project of National Social Science Foundation (2020)”, as well as the ongoing sub-project called “A Study on the Image and Nature of Chinese Taoism from the Perspective of Western Sinologists and Missionaries (English-speaking Countries Volume)" (2019) for Major Projects of Key Research Bases of Humanities and Social Sciences in Universities of the Ministry of Education; Dr. Fan Yachi over the Education National General Project of National Social Science Foundation of China in 2020 “A Study of Civic Education Theory in Teaching 20th Century American Literature" (approval number: BEA200109); Dr. Zhao Weiya over the "Research on Foreign Communication of Ba Shu Culture" under 2021 Sichuan Provincial Social Science Planning “A Study on the Writing and Dissemination of Chengdu Poetry Culture by Sinologist Eshkar”
Relying on superior discipline of Rail Traffic in Southwest Jiaotong University, the department of translation attaches major importance on the teaching of engineering English. For example, Associate Professor Dai Ruoyu presided over the Foreign Language Special Project of Sichuan Provincial Social Science Planning “Study on the Situation and Standards of English Translation of Chinese Railway Standards”. Similarly, he has involved into numerous high-level translation tasks, including the translation of the book called “Great Transportation: From the Belt and Road Initiative to the Community with Shared Future for Humanity” and the full-length three-episode documentary by Xinhua News Agency “ My Railway, My Story”, as well as the full-length documentary “Trade Winds between China and Africa” (part one and part two)in 2018, the full-length three-episode documentary “Light of Wisdom: Belt and Road” in 2019. With all these efforts and achievements made, he, Associate Professor Dai Ruoyu, was selected as a member of Expert Database for Standard Planning of Railway and Technological Translation of National Railway Administration of People’s Republic of China and member of the Translator’s Association of China.
In addition to the focus attached to bilingual ability and translation capability for students from department of translation, great importance was given upon the cultivation of student’s critical thinking and scientific research to advance their further development. With the instruction of Professor Yu, the English paper was officially published on Critical Sociology (on SSCI Journal), which is written by undergraduate from translation department titled “Translations of Max Weber’s The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism in China” . And the English book review gets officially published on Critical Studies in Media Communications (SSCI Journal), which is written by undergraduate from translation department titled “The Twitter presidency: Donald J. Trump and the politics of white rage” supervised by Associate Professor Li Zhou.
The department of translation will continue its hardworking in scientific research to boost teaching quality, as well as conduct reforms in undergraduate education to deliver much contributions to talents development for our nation under the leadership of the School of the Foreign Languages.
