From I am, with sincere regard, your most obedient servant to Yours sincerely: The simplification of leavetaking formulae in 18th-century Scottish and Irish English letters

Abstract

Abstract The study in hand investigates the impact of social status on the use and change of pragmatic formulae in historical varieties of English. The study asks which leavetaking formulae are used between writers of equal social status in varieties of English in the later 18th century. Working on a corpus of letters compiled from two subsets of letters each from 18th-century Scottish and Irish English, the study illustrates pragmatic change on the basis of the investigation of leavetakings involving the servant formula. By doing so, the study also helps to widen the hitherto predominating narrow focus on mainly English English. The study shows that the use of formulae is situationally dependant. It suggests that pragmatic change takes place amongst writers of equal social status in the private domain, which then leads to the use of such formulae in the public domain and to the use between writers of different status groups.