An investigation of projection and temporal reference in Kaqchikel

This dissertation is an investigation of two categories of meaning: projective content and temporal reference. Both topics have been discussed widely in literature for better studied languages, primarily English, but have received much less attention in both formal semantics and in documentary and descriptive literature for languages that are under-studied. Using data from primary fieldwork conducted in Guatemala on the Mayan language, Kaqchikel, I contribute to the discussion of the semantics of under-studied languages by investigating linguistic expressions that trigger implications, which are said to project out of the scope of entailment canceling operators, such as negation. For the first half of the dissertation, I introduce the concepts and diagnostics to determine if an implication is projective both in English and in Kaqchikel. I then show how the diagnostics are borne out in Kaqchikel both for projection and for at-issue meaning. I then turn to an investigation of temporal reference and provide an analysis of Kaqchikel as a tenseless language, which leads into the discussion in Ch. 6 on particles in the language with projective and temporal implications. I conclude by drawing on the results from both studies to discuss the implications for future studies both in Kaqchikel and for other languages.