At a moment when issues of bilingualism assume greater importance in the United States and as neurocognitive techniques rapidly gain terrain in SLA research, an extension of Paradis’s (Reference Paradis2004) neurolinguistic theory of bilingualism could hardly be more timely. This volume stands out for its clarity, accessibility, and thought-provoking style.
The book contains a preface and five chapters. The preface and first chapter provide the theoretical foundation for the rest of the book. Chapter 1 expands on the overview of Paradis’s (Reference Paradis2004) model with definitions of terms and clarifications of the framework and emphasis on the distinction between implicit linguistic knowledge, which depends on procedural memory and yields acquisition, and explicit metalinguistic knowledge, which relies on declarative memory and leads to learning. The SLA-oriented audience will find the comparison between Paradis’s and Ullman’s (Reference Ullman2006) models particularly interesting and possibly open to objection.
Chapters 2–5 focus on the impact of Paradis’s (Reference Paradis2004) model on consciousness research (chapter 2), second language (L2) teaching (chapter 3), ultimate attainment (chapter 4), and processing and language attrition (chapter 5). Chapter 2 centers on the role of consciousness in language learning and particularly highlights the relationship between consciousness and perception, attention, noticing, and working memory, and what can or cannot become conscious. The working memory section lacks discussion essential to the implicit-explicit distinction debate. For example, working memory employs selective attention mechanisms, which, by definition, involve suppression processes (there is no selection without suppression), and yet no predictions are made regarding consciousness and suppression. Although learners might be aware of which cues they use, suppression processes could result from an accumulation of implicit perception experiences or from flashes of explicit perception (Cleeremans, Reference Cleeremans2003). Additionally, Paradis affirms that language acquisition prior to the critical period is implicit and that working memory is explicit, but he fails to explain how these two constructs interact in his noninterface model. Chapter 3 expands the proposals made in chapter 2 with counterarguments against Ellis’s (Reference Ellis2005) claim that explicit knowledge can promote (i.e., interface with) the development of implicit competence. Paradis argues that Ellis provides insufficient theoretical justification and evidence and that the impact of explicit knowledge on acquisition is purely indirect. Similar to a chapter 1 section on objections to Ullman’s so-called misunderstandings, chapter 3 is written with a persuasive and dogmatic language that will give skeptical readers and seasoned SLA scholars food for thought. Those interested in the other side of the story can read Ellis and should refer to studies that suggest that explicit representations can enter into implicit tallying and priming with training and time for consolidation (e.g., Dumay & Gaskell, Reference Dumay and Gaskell2007).
In chapter 4, Paradis argues that adult learners rely on declarative memory because the procedural memory they used as children loses plasticity with age. This claim is supported by studies that compare children with adults and among adults with different onset ages. Chapter 5 provides further evidence of this and other tenets of the theory and concludes that Paradis’s (Reference Paradis2004) model should be taken into account when conducting experimental research on bilingualism—from single-word laterality and neuroimaging studies (single words are learned explicitly and cannot speak to the implicit representation of language) to language switching (explicit) and mixing (implicit) to explicit and implicit simultaneous translation strategies.
In sum, this volume will interest psycholinguists, neurolinguists, and SLA researchers. Readers already familiar with Paradis’s (Reference Paradis2004) work can benefit from the model additions, updated information on diverse topics, new data that claim to bolster central tenets of the theory, and plenty of room for rebuttal. Those less familiar with Paradis’s research and the explicit-implicit distinction and interface debate can read the preface (a synopsis of the 2004 book) and the appendix that summarizes key proposals (giving an overview of the constructs created after 2004) before delving into the individual chapters. Audiences that are newly acquainted with this work should be warned to take the book with a grain of salt, sometimes a handful, and to refer to seminal studies that describe the models criticized in this volume before drawing their own conclusions.
