Tenseyo

Tenseyo is a term used in linguistic theory to describe a speculative framework that treats time reference and evidential stance as interrelated components within a single morphosyntactic system.

The term is not part of mainstream typological taxonomy and is mainly found in discussions of tense and aspect typology, as well as in some constructed-language communities that experiment with unified tense markers. It is typically described as a thought experiment or design space rather than a fixed theory.

Core ideas associated with tenseyo include a single affix or clitic that carries both temporal value (past, present, future) and evidential or perspective value (direct, indirect, shared assumption). The system may interact with mood and aspect markers and can be described as agglutinative or fusional, depending on the language model.

In use, tenseyo is employed to illustrate how different languages might compress multiple layers of temporality and epistemology into compact morphology, and to explore the boundaries of cross-linguistic variation. It also appears in worldbuilding and conlang design as a tool for testing consistent, minimal morphologies. See also tense, aspect, evidentiality, mood, language typology, constructed language.