Tempopessoa

Tempopessoa is a neologism in contemporary Brazilian Portuguese that describes the subjective experience of time as it relates to an individual. The word combines tempo (time) and pessoa (person) to designate a mode of temporality shaped by mood, memory, attention, and social rhythms rather than clock time alone. It is not a formal dictionary entry and is mostly encountered in essays, criticism, and informal discourse.

In usage, tempopessoa can refer to a person whose life unfolds in accelerated or slowed time, depending on internal states or contexts such as routine, digital media use, or creative work. It is often invoked in discussions of phenomenology, memory, and cultural studies to describe how subjectivity alters the felt duration of events.

Although not standardized, the term is used to discuss characters in literature, as well as real individuals who seem to inhabit a different tempo from the surrounding world. It may be contrasted with clock time, objective duration, or social tempo, which measure time by schedules and routines. The concept aligns with broader discussions of how perception of time varies between people and across cultures, and it is sometimes linked to theories of time in philosophy and cognitive science.

In related discourse, tempopessoa echoes ideas about time as experienced rather than merely measured, intersecting with topics such as subjective time, phenomenology, memory, and the influence of digital media on daily rhythms.