As Valdés explains in the introduction, this book is about

The authors' goal is to show that the linguistic and cognitive processing skills that young people demonstrate when they interpret are part of what it means to be gifted and that this giftedness needs to be measured, nurtured, and developed with Latino immigrant students.

There are formidable challenges to accomplishing this goal: (a) traditional definitions and constructs of giftedness do not include bilingual performance; (b) there is confusion about what “bilingualism” means and a general understanding that bilingualism is a limiting condition rather than a talent or skill; (c) there are few mechanisms in place for identifying interpreting skills of bilingual young people; (d) Latino—and especially Mexican—children are significantly underrepresented in gifted programs, and many researchers and educators who work in gifted education have limited experience with recently arrived immigrant students; and (e) even if researchers and educators expanded their understandings of giftedness, the general public needs to be convinced that immigrant students might be gifted and included in gifted programs.

This book seeks to address these challenges and suggests actions to be taken. The authors look at giftedness through linguistic and cultural lenses to attempt to understand the particular kind of linguistic giftedness of Latino youngsters. In chapter 1, “In Search of Giftedness: The Case of Latino Immigrant Children,” Valdés argues that we must move away from traditional definitions of giftedness, which focus on intellectual ability as measured by IQ and aptitude tests.

Chapter 2, “Bilinguals and Bilingualism,” outlines what bilingualism means and focuses on the bilingual abilities of interpreters. Bilingualism involves having some level of proficiency in more than one language. Linguistic abilities occur along a continuum, with different language strengths in languages A and B in different bilinguals and in different times in their lives. Interpretation, a particular use of bilingual skills, involves “the reformulation of a message presented or delivered in one language into another language” (p. 25). The chapter describes the skills of professional translators and interpreters and of novice interpreters and ethnographic studies of young interpreters at work.

Successful interpretation requires not only language skill and complex cognitive abilities but also the following: (a) knowledge of different cultures and how to handle a variety of social contexts; (b) ability to handle the immediate context—interlocutors, roles, power relations, and cross-cultural dynamics—and to assess and negotiate these dynamics and engage in cross-cultural mediation; and (c) the ability to engage in reflective thinking, monitor one's own and others' interpretations and determine to what extent an utterance interpreted into a language has the same meaning as the source language, show rapid recall and enhanced memory capacity, display sensitivity to interpretation difficulties caused by cultural differences, and transfer cultural meaning across linguistic forms.

In the remaining seven chapters, the authors describe their study of young interpreters and their parents. They describe a simulated interpretation task to examine the behaviors of experienced young interpreters in middle and high school. The authors found that, when interpreting, the youngsters had to transmit original information, convey the tone and stance of each utterance, keep up with the demands and pace of the interaction, and monitor and compensate for their own linguistic limitations. To varying degrees, the young interpreters were able to utilize the resources in their two languages. Several students displayed an impressive range of abilities in both languages and traits considered by several theorists to be indications of giftedness.

The authors conclude that we need tests and procedures that can capture the complexities of the bilingual experience and identify superior academic performance or potential in bilingual children, and we need to restructure school programs to develop the talents of these students.

This is an important and groundbreaking book. Teachers and administrators working in gifted programs and with students whose native language is not English need to read it and expand their understanding of what giftedness involves.