Knowledge storage versus knowledge access

There is always the possibility that knowledge of a language is a single entity but one can develop it and have access to it in two different ways. Hence, for example, if I can produce questions like ‘What am I doing?’, this means at the very least that I have some intuitive knowledge of English interrogatives. If I can talk about it and perhaps even give a rule, this means that I have explicit knowledge of this area of the language. But it is the same knowledge as the intuitive knowledge: I have simply uncovered it, i.e. made it ‘visible’ to conscious analysis. I can also acquire new knowledge either intuitively or by using my conscious analysis. This third, commonsense, which lay understanding of the knowledge as a single store may also be shared by many researchers. Most of the literature on the topic has, however, tended to support some idea of two separate knowledge stores, the argument being about whether they can influence one another and, if so, how.

According to which proposals that one favoured, one could see Interlanguage knowledge as consisting of:

(1) two entirely different non-interacting kinds of knowledge;

(2) two entirely different kinds of knowledge but still capable of influencing one another;

(3) the same knowledge but one which could be developed and accessed in two different ways (intuitively and consciously)

Source; SMITH, Michael Sharwood. Second Language Learning: theoretical foundations. New York: Longman, 1994, p. 95.