I am a doctoral researcher at Goethe University within the Collaborative Research Centre “Negation in Language and Beyond” (SFB 1629). In project B04 we investigate how negation interacts with coordination and the range of scopal interpretations these constructions give rise to across languages. I am currently a visiting researcher at MIT for the months of September and October 2026.
I am a semanticist by training, but I also work at the interface of syntax-semantics. I am particularly fascinated by semantic polyfunctionality. My topics of interest include Negative Polarity Items (NPIs), scalar particles, coordination and questions. I also have a fondness for fieldwork.
My dissertation examines the polyfunctionality of “coordinative clitics” in Dravidian languages which, beyond marking vanilla coordination, also appear in surprising areas like questions, indefinites, and relative clauses.
Before starting my PhD in Frankfurt, I received my M.Sc in Linguistics at the University of Potsdam. In my Masters thesis I developed a semantic analysis of strong necessity modals in Kannada.
Presentations
- 19/07/2026 — The Many Lives of the Scalar Additive Particle -uu in Kannada. The 7th Crete Summer School of Linguistics, Rethymnon, Greece. [poster]
- 27/01/2026 — When They Go Low, We Go High. NegLaB Research Colloquium, Goethe University, Frankfurt. [talk]
- 23/01/2026 — Polyfunctionality of Coordination in Dravidian. Collaborative MGK Workshop, Goethe University, Frankfurt. [talk]
- 02/12/2025 — When They Go Low, We Go High. NegLaB II Workshop, Goethe University, Frankfurt. [poster]
- 22/09/2025 — The Polyfunctionality of Disjunction in Kannada. Syntax Colloquium, Goethe University, Frankfurt. [talk]
- 08/07/2025 — Scope mismatch and polarity in negative coordination: A case study from Turkish. NegLaB summer retreat. [poster]
- 06/02/2025 — Deconstructing Modal Necessity in Kannada. Semantics Colloquium, Goethe University, Frankfurt. [talk]
- 17/12/2024 — Negative scope mismatches in coordination. NegLaB I annual workshop. [talk]
- 29/10/2024 — Modal meaning in Kannada: beku and -ee as keys to understanding necessity. Tense, Aspect and Modality in South Asian Languages, INALCO, Paris. [talk]
Contact
Official: bharadwaj@lingua.uni-frankfurt.de · pra_bhar@mit.edu
Personal: prarthanaabharadwaj@gmail.com
Office: Room IG 5.257 · +49 69 798-32054