“I remain(s)” and “but remain(s)”: Variation in the Use of the 3rd Person Singular Marker in American Private Letters from the mid-19th Century Radosław Dylewski, Magdalena Bator, Joanna Rabęda Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, Poland; WSB University in Poznań, Poland; Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, Poland ABSTRACT: The present paper focuses on the analysis of the formulaic expressions with the verb remain, which were used as letter closing formulae in private correspondence during the American Civil War. Sequences comprising one of the phrases: I/we remain(s) and but/only/so/still/etc. remain(s) were scrutinized in order to verify whether Dylewski’s claim (2018) that the origin of the two types of formulae took different paths of development holds true as regards highly homogenous material produced by uneducated writers. The study was based on over four thousand letters written by soldiers and their relatives, compiled and digitized in Private Voices on-line repository. KEYWORDS: formulaic expressions, private letters, the 19th century, vernacular English 1. Introduction The 19th century marks an increase in private correspondence in the US. The rise in literacy, but more importantly, the political situation which resulted in the Civil War, enhanced the exchange of letters. It is soldiers representing various levels of literacy who grabbed their pens – oftentimes for the first time – to write to their relatives and received news from home. This resulted in a plethora of letters, which might be of interest not only for historians but also (historical) linguists. No matter how well or poorly educated the authors were, their letters shared a common structure. The components typical of this text type, such as dates, places, names of addressees, opening and closing formulas are for the most part there. The latter elements of the letter structure usually take the form of one of a few formulaic expressions.
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