by Steve Martindale
Almost everyone will have owned a pair of jeans in their life, and everyone knows jeans are made of denim, but what are the origins of these words? As you may have guessed from their inclusion on this site, both are French!
The words ‘jeans’ comes from the French ‘bleu de Gênes’, or blue of Genoa, referring to the blue material originating in the Italian city from which the trousers were made.
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There are many good reasons to learn a second language, whatever your age. If you are young, studying more than one language can create job opportunities in an increasingly globalised world; if you are older and move abroad, then speaking the local tongue will enhance your experience on a social and cultural level. But there is also one added benefit that more and more studies are highlighting: speaking more than one language can stave off the effects of dementia.
The brain is a complex organ and the causes of dementia are still not fully understood, but there is an increasing body of evidence to suggest that polyglots will develop the disease later in life than those who only speak one language.
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