The school's purpose is to train and educate its students in the academic study or practice in linguistics and philology.

The Department of Philology gained independence from the University of Belgrade Faculty of Philosophy in 1960.

Many eminent international philologists contributed to the development of the Faculty of Philology, e.g. Russian Slavist Platon Kulikovsky, who was a visiting professor at the Higher School between 1877 and 1882, was the founder of Russian studies in Serbia; Englishman David Law started teaching English language and literature classes in 1907 and paved the way for the English Department (founded in 1929).

[6] The school's most known periodicals include: Prilozi za književnost, jezik, istoriju i folklor (as of 1921), Anali Filološkog fakulteta (1961) and Filološki pregled (as of 1997).

[8] Famous scholars and better-known students include: Danilo Kiš, Nikola Milošević, Matija Bećković, Ljubivoje Ršumović, Ljubomir Simović, Vladislav Bajac, Vladimir Kecmanović, Igor Marojević, Snežana Samardžić-Marković.