Timewords

Timewords are words whose primary function is to express temporal information. In linguistics, they place events on a timeline relative to the moment of speech or to another reference point. They can function as adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, or nouns and are used to indicate when an event occurs, how long it lasts, or in what order events happen.

Common timewords include absolute terms such as now, today, yesterday, and tomorrow; deictic phrases like this morning or next week; and relative terms such as soon, later, earlier, before, after, during, and until. Explicit time expressions specify calendar or clock times (at 3 p.m., in 1999). Some words encode duration (for two hours), while others express frequency (often, rarely).

In sentences, timewords typically function as adverbials or temporal modifiers, and they can occupy different positions for emphasis or flow. They interact with tense, aspect, and mood, and they may serve as discourse markers to guide transitions or signal topics. In some languages, timewords require case marking or clitic attachment.

Cross-linguistic variation means not all languages have a single universal set of timewords; some rely more on verb morphology, others use postposed particles or classifiers to indicate time. Timewords are a basic tool for narrative and planning discourse, information structuring, and temporal reasoning in language and communication.