Susie Dent (born 21 September 1967 in Woking, Surrey) is an English lexicographer, best known as the resident dictionary expert and adjudicator on Channel 4’s long-running game show Countdown.
Dent studied Modern Languages at the University of Oxford and German at Princeton University, USA, after which she worked as a language teacher in the United States and for a German publisher before going to work for the Oxford University Press (OUP). She now works as a writer and contributor to discussions of language issues and words in the news.
Since 2003 she has been the author of a series of annual Language Reports for the OUP. The first was entitled simply The Language Report; it was followed by Larpers and Shroomers (2004), Fanboys and Overdogs (2005), The like, Language Report for real (2006) and The Language Report: English on the Move 2000 - 2007 (2007). The format of this publication has been revised for 2008 as an A-Z collection of new and newly resurrected words, selected for their topicality and resonance. It will be published in September 2008 as Susie Dent's Words of the Year. Her book about dialects, How to Talk Like a Local, is scheduled for publication in April 2009.
Dent has appeared on Countdown for over 16 years, having made over 1,800 appearances. In his memoir, Himoff! (2000), Countdown's late presenter, Richard Whiteley testified to Susie's overwhelming popularity with viewers. She is currently consulting on a number of television projects, including a large-scale language venture for the BBC. As well as her native English, she is also fluent in French and German.
She lives in Oxford with her husband, Paul, and her daughters, Lucy, born on 11 February 2000, and Thea, born on 22 October 2007.
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