Josh Wood, visiting instructor of Spanish at Taylor, learned the language through living abroad without a prior heritage background.
Wood began to learn Spanish in high school. Then, he went on to study Spanish education at Grace College.
“I don’t know why but it came pretty natural to me,” Wood said. “I enjoyed the vocabulary, I enjoyed the culture, and then it was time to look at what I was going to major in in college.”
While in college, Wood spent seven months studying abroad in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
He was there for a summer and fall semester, living with a host family and working with missionaries. He also played baseball with a local team as a hobby during his trip.
“I got to see a little bit of the secular world,” Wood said. “Traveling, playing baseball and then also working with the missionaries. My host family was connected to Grace.”
Despite previously having been a missionary kid in Hong Kong, Wood claims this was the first time where he truly experienced living abroad and immersed himself in a different culture, since he was only four by the time his family returned from China.
While in Buenos Aires, Wood went to class five days a week, learning Spanish for eight hours a day. He would then go home to his host family, where he would have to speak Spanish even longer. He considers this the most valuable experience, to speak a different language at home.
“My high school teachers and even my college professors never spoke to me in Spanish,” Wood said. “I’d never even heard it spoken until I landed there in Argentina.”
After Buenos Aires, Wood taught Spanish at a high school in Los Angeles. His wife was a hall director at Azusa Pacific University, where he later got his master’s in education.
He would take students on hiking trips, and being able to interact with and get to know his students, he realized his passion for campus life and ministry.
He knew two professors who worked at Taylor at the time and, knowing his passion for teaching, they told him there was an opening for a Spanish professor.
“I have loved it here at Taylor,” Wood said. “I’m just so thankful to be here, and I’m thankful for the opportunities I have, like the trip to Guatemala. It was just incredible to go to because that kind of combined my two worlds.”
Wood encourages students to study abroad if they have the opportunity.
Leading a J-term trip to Guatemala this past January, Wood felt grateful to also share his own life-changing experiences with his students.
“There’s a lot of things about culture I didn’t quite understand, and how to really love our neighbors well,” Wood said. “And so to me, learning a new language can really help you love your neighbors. It can help you understand a little more when you know something is happening nationally.”
Wood said part of immersion and studying abroad is knowing what is happening in that country and how learning about their problems can help us learn to love our Spanish-speaking neighbors.
Ultimately, we can share the love of Christ better by communicating in a learned language in which we can understand each other and build bridges toward relationships.
Wood has encouraged the implementation of this at his home church in Indianapolis, which puts on Wednesday food pantry nights.
“As of last month, we’re really losing people based on fear, based on what’s been changing as far as a community,” Wood said. “And so we’re trying to really love our Spanish-speaking neighbors.”
