Dr Krishnan Ram-Prasad
My research spans two distinct but overlapping areas of linguistics: Comparative Philology and Historical Syntax. My particular focus is on syntactic reconstruction and Proto-Indo-European. My first major project, encompassing my PhD thesis (2022) and my first book (under contract with Cambridge University Press), investigates the structure of relative clauses in Proto-Indo-European within the theoretical framework of Minimalist syntax. I also have smaller projects addressing specific points of syntactic interest within the attested ancient Indo-European languages.
At a broader level, my research leads me to focus closely on the links between synchronic and diachronic syntax, grammaticalisation, and language change at large. In the course of my research I have worked across a wide range of Indo-European languages, both ancient and modern; those I have a particular specialism in include Latin, Ancient Greek, Sanskrit and Hittite.
Alongside my linguistic research, I have a commitment to decolonising Classics and the study of the ancient world more generally. In this connection, I work on the role Comparative Philology can play in a critical reassessment of the wider discipline.
I tutor for various undergraduate courses in both General Linguistics and Classical Philology. I have also taught language classes in Latin, Ancient Greek, Sanskrit and Old English.
- Under contract. Relative Clauses in Proto-Indo-European: A study in syntactic reconstruction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- In press. (with D. Bate). “Wackernagel’s Law in Vedic and Old Irish”. Proceedings of the 34th Annual UCLA Indo-European Conference.
- 2023. “Clitics and the left periphery in the Sanskrit of the Rigveda”. Journal of Historical Syntax 7(22):1–53. DOI: 10.18148/hs/2023.v7i22.172.
- 2023. “Comparative Philology and Critical Ancient World Studies”. In Critical Ancient World Studies: The case for forgetting Classics (M. Umachandran & M. Ward, eds.). London: Routledge, pp. 91–106. DOI: 10.4324/9781003222637-9.
