Trivial arts

BACK TO BASICS -- A thorough education used to be considered a solid knowledge of the Seven Liberal Arts: Grammar, Logic and Rhetoric (known as the Trivium), as well as Arithmetic, Music, Geometry and Astronomy (known as the quadrivium).


The first three yielded the term now called "trivial." But unlike its original meaning connoting "important, basic," the current meaning of "trivial" conveys a sense of little or no importance, and not worth spending time on. Consequently, the teaching of Grammar is ignored (by students, partly because their instructors don't understand it, either); Logic is offered largely to Philosophy majors in college or as an elective; and Rhetoric, the art of persuasion through well-constructed sentences, is dismissed as political or marketing gimmickry -- an attempt to get people to do something they don't want to do.


Of the remaining four, Arithmetic has been surrendered to the use of electronic calculators. Music is one of the first programs to fall victim to budget cuts, Geometry is victimized by rote and stultifying boredom, and Astronomy is limited to Boy Scout troops and university graduate specialists.


Rhetoric is not a dirty word. It is the ability to use Grammar (the relationships of words to each other), Syntax (the use of well-constructed sentences), and Logic (the arrangement of concepts and ideas) to prove or disprove something.


Success in writing depends on the appropriate use of "trivial" strategies.