The Trivium

I tried to get answers on Veeky Forums but had no luck.

I've recently become interested in a more classical form of education. How could one follow the Trivium nowadays? Does anyone know where I can find a rubric or a book to get me started?

Other urls found in this thread:

media.evolveconsciousness.org/books/consciousness/The Trivium - The Liberal Arts of Logic, Grammar, and Rhetoric - Sister Mirriam Joseph.pdf
yuki.la/lit/9475678
philosophy.hku.hk/think/
coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-learn/
twitter.com/NSFWRedditImage

you've read this i assume

made me wish i had had more stern nuns in my education tbqh

media.evolveconsciousness.org/books/consciousness/The Trivium - The Liberal Arts of Logic, Grammar, and Rhetoric - Sister Mirriam Joseph.pdf

it's a meme

Don't forget the Quadrivium (which I will now attempt to recite from memory, looking it up afterwards). These two category groups combine to form the ancient conception of the Liberal Arts.

Arithmetic, Geometry, Astronomy and Music.

OP, the answer to your question is another question: do you want to actually learn and understand these things, or do you simply want the historical version of how they were understood that the time when the trivium and the quadrivium were things? If the latter, then just meme it up with Aristotle and Aquinas and such. If you want to actually learn useful and valid things instead beyond the intrigue of history, then read modern texts instead.

Yes, I own. I'm about to reread it after I finish a couple of more recreational reads.
Care to elaborate?
I'm more interested in the Trivium in order to understand it. It seems that it focused on understanding text and self-expression. I admire the Latin focus though I doubt I have the intelligence to teach myself Latin. I think following it could improve my writing and my reading comprehension.

Bump

You're mixing up classical education with classical curriculum. As a curriculum you can learn all those things in a few weeks on the internet. But the education system is so totally different that you can't/won't follow it.

Go look at the "how to think" or "learning how to think" thread in the archive. A bunch of Trivium-related books were posted towards the end.

I do want to follow it, but I suppose you're right. I may find it tedious or useless. More than anything, I want to truly challenge myself, but I operate with the understanding that I'm relatively ignorantof most subjects.
Thanks, will do.

wew that picture is retarded

Hey OP, I have a book called The Well-Disciplined Mind which is a guide to classical homeschool education (getting married soon and am preparing). I dunno, might be useful for someone trying to autodidact their way through the trivium (it talks a lot about the trivium and quadrivium as a good basis for education, though mostly primary and secondary education). Also, don't underestimate yourself, I bet if you got the right books, worked hard, and maybe found a class at your local CC that you could learn Latin at least well enough to read Caesar or medieval authors within a year of study. It's not as hard as people make it out once you get into it. Just a lot of memorizing declension patterns. If you do end up looking into that, I'd start with Wheelock and Lingua Latina per se illustrata (which can be had for free on the internet).

Following it:
>copy out pieces, write them out, hundreds of them, memorize them all, memorize the rules they use and why, write out everything you can about them down to each word/phrase, interpret arguments and explain them down the style/rules used
>practice doing each style over and over until you can do them flawlessly
>practice imitating the authors you have memorized
>go back and critique the pieces you learned, explain exactly why they work or don't work
Now that might seem tedious but you have no idea user. The classical style is all about mastery, 10000 hours is a modern meme, this is your life user. You will become a master if you follow this path but I can almost guarantee that you won't.

I can see my job getting in the way of it. That path could potentially last a decade or more. What pieces? I know they used to memorize and copy Cicero and Virgil. I also can't say I understand how to find"the rules they use" from just the pieces. I can see how doing this without an instructor would be an awful experience. I still feel a strange desire to try, but I wonder if can even attempt it seriously while working and finishing up my BA.

My main problem with learning other languages is that my grasp on my own language's grammar is pretty shaky. I definitely can write well enough, and I don't make obvious errors but I sense the gaps. For example, I can't tell when one should use "who" or "whom." I'll look out a simple guide but it does no good.

seconded, this book was amazing.

The pieces don't matter as long as they have some rules, like a sonnet, ode, victory speech, tragedy etc. And the rules can be learned from wikipedia probably.
An instructor would be useful but most likely they wouldn't use that method. The only fields you will find people doing anything like that are music (which is probably closest to classical methods) and maths (which still involves doing lots of repetitive exercises to internalize ideas).
I can't answer whether you can find time to do it because honestly I don't think anyone can anymore.

Looks like it's no longer in the archive! Here's the thread on an off-site archive:

yuki.la/lit/9475678

Here is some choice recommendations:

>General Stuff
How to Read a Book - Mortimer J. Adler
The Trivium - Sister Miriam Joseph
The Oxford Essential Guide to Writing - Thomas S. Kane
The Art of Fiction - David Lodge
Pre-Calculus - C. Stitz & J. Zeager

>Grammar Basics:
Rex Barks - Phyllis Davenport
Grammar by Diagram - Vitto
Practical English - Semmelmeyer
Drawing Sentences - Moutoux
Descriptive English Grammar 2e - House and Harman
Understanding English Grammar - Kolln
Revising Prose - Lanham
Analysing Prose - Lanham

>Logic Basics
A Rule for Arguments - Anthony Weston
An Introduction to Formal Logic - Peter Smith

>Rhetoric Basics:
Thank You For Arguing
Classic Rhetoric for the Modern Student

FYI: I think that The Trivium's logic section is also good for logic, and The Art of Fiction + TOEGtW by Kane are good for rhetoric, too.

This is great. Thanks!! I'll see if I can find these on IRC.

I'm going to have to agree. If I was still in high school I would attempt it, but I don't know if I have time now. Once I finish my degree and start job hunting, I'll have even less time.

>


Anyway, here's the booklist:

>AUTODIDACT CORE:
How to Read a Book - Mortimer J. Adler
The Trivium - Sister Miriam Joseph
The Oxford Essential Guide to Writing - Thomas S. Kane

Basics of studying, the basics of thinking, and basics of the structures of ideas which you may think about. A strong studying method and a grasp of the basics of thinking/ideas will show you how to charitably tackle new ideas, help you develop an appreciation for the complexity of ideas, and teach you to reformulate ideas to express them in the clearest ways possible.

>AUTODIDACT CRITICAL THINKING:
Creative and Critical Thinking: W. Edgar Moore
Thinking, Fast and Slow - Daniel Kahneman

Basics of the "cognitive" aspects of thinking. What are you doing when you think? How do you take your thinking beyond the limits of your biology?

>AUTODIDACT SELF-IMPROVEMENT:
The Discourses - Epictetus
A Primer in Positive Psychology - Christopher Peterson

>AUTODIDACT LIBERAL ARTS:
The Art of Fiction - David Lodge
The Bible (KJV/NKJV)
Atlas of World History - Patrick O'Brien
The Interpretation of Cultures - Clifford Geertz
Western Philosophy: An Anthology - John Cottingham
Music In Theory And Practice - Bruce Benward
Pre-Calculus - C. Stitz & J. Zeager


An investigation into the essences of all different kinds of thinking, with the goal of understanding the purpose of a subject and the fundamentals that govern it (perhaps not quite the foundations, though you should be prepared to begin progressing towards them with hard work). This isn't the final goal, but just the stepping stones to either more sophisticated kinds of thinking in a field, or less fundamental subjects that combine multiple types of thinking, such as economics.

>AUTODIDACT SOCIAL SKILLS:
Improve Your Social Skills - Daniel Wendler
How to Speak, How to Listen -- Mortimer J. Adler
philosophy.hku.hk/think/


>Grammar Basics:
Rex Barks - Phyllis Davenport
Grammar by Diagram - Vitto
Practical English - Semmelmeyer
Drawing Sentences - Moutoux
Descriptive English Grammar 2e - House and Harman
Understanding English Grammar - Kolln
Revising Prose - Lanham
Analysing Prose - Lanham

>Logic Basics
A Rule for Arguments - Anthony Weston
An Introduction to Formal Logic - Peter Smith

>Rhetoric Basics:
Thank You For Arguing
Classic Rhetoric for the Modern Student


Somewhat related online course (it's free)

coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-learn/

This is just a general booklist. Not specifically for the Trivium. But I like it.

Wow, the thread dies as soon as content is posted

I mean, we can discuss the Trivium. There isn't much to it.

>made me wish i had had more stern nuns in my education tbqh

Being hit with rulers by poorly educated sexually repressed women didnt help me much as a kid, maybe contemporary nuns are different

My dad was physically abused by both the nuns and priests...like brutally. Broken hands, broken noses, fractured ribs, black eyes and so on. He and my mom split up and he didn't have any input in my upbringing except he told my mother that if she sent me to Catholic school he'd kill her. My mother was convinced he was serious. I went to public school

Jesus Christ

That was the tip of the iceberg. This was back in the 50s and early 60s. After the priests and nuns beat him he'd get beat again at home for "forcing" the priests and nuns to "soil" their "holy" hands on him. Catholic schools were no joke back then. It started when he was 5 years old and went on till he was 16 when he started fighting back and got kicked out. Never once did his parents question any of his injuries at the hands of the clergy. In their eyes he must have deserved it because it was priests and nuns.

Uhhh.. cristianity is the kindest and most heart warmed moral there is user. Have you ever considered the MOST obvious reason? that your dad was a prick like most kids at that age?? Kids that age needs dicipline if they hope to become good, useful people of society.
If something the only reason for you to be mad about the church is that they failed on this task, since your father grew up to be an agressive, irresponsible prick that didn't took responsability to his child and wife and instead threatened them to death.

Sorry the church wasn't hard enought on your dad user, sorry he left you and threatened your mom, your only support to death just because "adultz were mean to me wha wha".

God bless you.

You are a sick puppy user.

Shut up fag

I hate how /pol/ spills out to the better boards.