Tenri University: Institution Main

About Tenri University:

In 1925, Tenri University (天理大学 Tenri daigaku) was established as the Tenri School of Foreign Language, founded by Shōzen Nakayama, with the initial mission of training Tenri missionaries to have foreign language skills. It was the first private foreign language school in Japan. The school has five departments: Korean, Chinese, Cantonese, Malay, and Russian. They are also known as the first private institute to offer the study of Korean language, although Korea was not then recognized by the Japanese government.

The Tenri School of Foreign Language became Tenri University in 1949 with the Faculty of letters, followed by the Faculty of Foreign Language in 1952. The university added the Faculty of Health and Sports Studies in 1955, and the Faculty of Human Studies and the Faculty of International Culture Studies in 1992. Currently, Tenri University has four Faculties: Letters, Human Studies, Budō and Sports Studies (2010), and International Studies (2010), and the Graduate School of Clinical Human Studies (2004).