ABSTRACT
How are the two languages of a bilingual represented in the cognitive network? Rather than simply speak of the underlying representation for a given word, theorists who do research with monolinguals suggest that different kinds of information about language enjoy independent representation in the cognitive network. For example, the interactive activation model of word recognition proposed by McClelland and Rumelhart (1981) and Rumelhart and McClelland (1982) postulates the existence of three discrete levels of representation: an orthographic level for the representation of letter information, a lexical level for the representation of word information, and a conceptual level for the representation of meaning. All three levels are interconnected, such that there is bottom-up activation from the orthographic to the lexical to the semantic levels as well as top-down activation in the reverse order. In addition to these between-level connections, there are also connections within the semantic system, with the result that activation of a given conceptual representation produces a spread of activation to related conceptual representations. Assuming this degree of interconnectedness between and within the various levels of the cognitive system, it is difficult to speak of any one aspect of language representation in isolation. Nonetheless, in this chapter, I focus on the issue of lexical representation in the bilingual.
