moodINDICATIVE

MoodIndicative refers to the indicative mood in grammar, the grammatical category used to express statements of fact, descriptions, and questions treated as factual. It is the default mood in many languages and contrasts with modalities such as the subjunctive or the imperative.

Function and usage: The indicative marks propositions believed to be real or certain. It commonly encodes tense and aspect through verb conjugation, providing present, past, and future forms, and can include perfect or progressive aspects in many languages.

Examples: English presents the most familiar use: The sun rises in the east. They have finished their homework. In Spanish, the present indicative is used as in Yo hablo español; the preterite is used for past actions as in Ayer hablé.

Morphology and syntax: Many languages require subject-verb agreement in the indicative, and verb forms often depend on person and number. Some languages employ periphrastic tenses with auxiliary verbs to express past or future, while others rely on inflection alone to convey time reference.

Cross-linguistic notes: Although the term indicative is widely used, the exact set of tenses and their distribution varies by language family. In English and many Germanic languages, the indicative covers most declarative sentences; in other languages, additional moods or periphrastic constructions may intersect with indicative usage.

Etymology: The term derives from the Latin indicativus, meaning "showing, pointing out."