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almost exclusively to promote words that
have fallen into obscurity. "There never was
a golden age when English was perfect, but
I do think there is a richness of vocabulary
that is getting left behind," she explains.
Her dedication is such that she even tweeted
on Christmas day – a thoughtful "reminder
today that 'confelicity' is delight in someone
else's happiness."
Far from railing against language change,
though, Dent delights just as much in
neologisms. She authored a popular series
of OUP reports looking at words entering
English, and notes that viewers write to
Countdown daily, asking how to get a new
word into the dictionary. "Love them or hate
them, new words have always fascinated us –
they are, after all, the shop window of our
language," she says.
For Dent's Modern Tribes, she explored
the coded language used by different
groups – from surgeons to plumbers. The
book is partly based on notes made through
years of "eavesdropping" on conversations
in search of linguistic gems. "Most of the
time we aren't aware that we are using a
vocabulary that's unique to our group," she
explains. "But every group, every family, has
their own special vocabulary."
Home life is no exception and children, in
particular, are masters of linguistic invention.
Dent's first children's book, Weird Words, was
born of her desire to encourage their natural
curiosity about language, and she has always
allowed her daughters – now aged 10 and
18 – to be creative with their language use.
But perhaps the work that most closely
reflects Dent's view of language – and
emotional connection to it – is Modern
Tribes, with its perception of language's
ability to create a cosy sense of belonging.
When the family moved house recently, Dent
came across a box of old novels from her
school days as she was unpacking. "I found a
book by Thomas Mann called Tonio Kröger,
together with Le Silence de la Mer by Vercors.
They're both beautiful if soppy, and reading
them again, even with an older and less
swayable mind, I can see how I became
hopelessly lost in them as a teenager."
It seems that these little linguistic joys –
returning to familiar foreign-language books,
snatched conversations in German, the
unique family language "like an old cardigan
you can shuffle into at the end of the day" –
are what ground Dent through a long career
in the public eye, and make her feel at home.
