Online Writing Lab - (OWL)
PLAGIARISM: How to Avoid it
Guidelines for recognizing and avoiding it
Definition: Generally speaking,
plagiarism is regarded as a form of cheating or stealing. It is censured as an act
of willfully or carelessly attempting to pass off as one's own work the writing of someone
else. Usually the student who is proved guilty of plagiarism is given a failing
grade on the research paper, and, if the plagiarism is intentional, the student is given
no credit for the course in which the paper is submitted.
Guidelines: Students must realize, therefore, from the beginning of their research,
that the handling of source material is always a delicate matter. Writers may
copy or paraphrase any information or statistics from another source so long as proper
credit is given to that source. When a student submits to an instructor a paper
bearing her name as the author, she is required to indicate copied material by enclosing
it in quotation marks and by using an appropriate citation. Paraphrased or summarized
material must also be shown by using a footnote, endnote, or by giving parenthetical
documentation in the text of the paper. For example, here is a sentence from
The
Christian Science Monitor: "They [the Black Caucus] argued in a letter
to Mr. Clinton that 96 percent of crack arrests are of minorities, and that between 1988
and 1994 in Los Angeles, the only persons prosecuted for crack-cocaine sales were blacks
and Latinos." Whether a writer quotes from those words directly or summarizes
them in his/her own words, there must be a parenthetical reference in the text (Marquand
3) and a complete reference in the Works Cited at the end of the paper.
If a paper contains several sentences, one sentence, or merely significant parts of
sentences that are obviously not original work --because of the wording or the nature of
the information given--students may be suspected of plagiarism. If the expressions
or order of presentation of ideas are identical to or are similar to material in print and
if no reference is made to the source, it may be assumed that a student is deliberately
attempting to pass off or, to put it stronger, to forge a piece of writing that does not
really belong to him/her.
Within the field of academics and among professionals, such plagiarism is a breach of
ethics and may break copyright law. Scholars, playwrights, musicians, and other writers
whose careers and reputations are built upon their research and use of words have a legal
right to those words. Proper documentation is not a difficult task; therefore, students
who plagiarize should expect to fail the course.
DIXIE COLLEGE ACADEMIC DISCIPLINE POLICY: "Academic dishonesty in any form
will not be tolerated at Dixie College, including but not limited to plagiarism on written
assignments, submitting other persons’ work as one’s own, and cheating on exams
or quizzes. Teachers at Dixie College may discipline students proven guilty of academic
dishonesty by –
Giving a failing grade on the specific assignment where dishonest occurred,
Failing the student in the entire course,
Immediately dismissing and removing the student from the course and/or
Referring the student to Student Affairs, a committee which may reprimand, place on
probation, suspend, and /or expel the students."
Now that you have learned the general guidelines, here are some places to learn the
specific rules for citing various kinds of information:
Most English rhetorics or handbooks will have a section on resource supported writing;
check yours.
The Research Paper Guide, a printed pamphlet, is available in the bookstore
and online.
Going to the Dixie College Online Writing Lab (http://dsc.dixie.edu/owl/) provides
links to the MLA Style Guide, which is used in most English courses, or the APA Style
Guide, which is used often in the sciences, nursing, education, and in social studies.
The Reference Librarian on duty has a copy of the current MLA Handbook.
Let’s look at some examples of plagiarism commonly committed, even by those who
know the general guidelines:
Exhibit A: 1) Although thoughts about suicide are common among Hospice
patients, persistent requests for aid in dying are, by most accounts, very uncommon.
2) Alcohol has been proven to cause cancer of the mouth, tongue, esophagus, larynx,
stomach, liver, lungs, colon, and rectum.
Students excused the above plagiarism by saying they were just summarizing an article,
not quoting from it. Any information--no matter whether quoted, paraphrased, or
summarized--that you take from another source must be cited.
Exhibit B: Original: "Although harder to use, QuickTime 3.0 and Adobe
Premier team up for a cross platform solution for creating the audio slide lecture."
Paraphrase: QuickTime 3.0 and Adobe Premier are harder to use, but they
work well together in creating a cross platform solution for someone who wants to create
an audio slide lecture (Kaplan 51).
Although this student did give a parenthetical reference to the original (and, we
assume, added more information in the Works Cited at the end of the paper), this is still
a form of plagiarism because the paraphrase follows too closely the wording of the
original. The general rule is that if you use three or more words in a row from the
original, those words should be in quotes.
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Copyright (C)2008 by Ed Reber. All rights
reserved. This document may be distributed as long as it is done entirely with all
attributions to organizations and authors. Commercial distribution is strictly prohibited.
Portions of this document may be copyrighted by other organizations.
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