Understanding and avoiding plagiarism

 

The purpose of this assignment is twofold: 1) to ensure that you have a precise and thorough understanding of the different forms of plagiarism, and 2) for you to demonstrate your ability to incorporate source material into your writing correctly, avoiding unintentional plagiarism.

Overview: In this assignment you will do each of the following tasks (full instructions in the appropriate sections below):

Part I: plagiarism defined.

General definition of plagiarism: As stated in The Citadel's Honor Manual, "Plagiarism is the act of using someone else's words or ideas as your own without giving proper credit to the source."

In academic writing, you will often incorporate others' words and ideas into your own writing. The key is that you always indicate when you are using someone else's words directly by enclosing them in quote marks and acknowledging whose words you are using, usually through footnotes, end notes, or some form of in-text citation such as the MLA or APA method of documenting sources. The MLA method used in Citadel English classes is to put the author's last name and the page number(s) of prose quotations in parentheses at the end of the sentence containing the quotation (or for longer quotations, at the end of the quotation itself). If the author or source of the quotation is established in your introduction of the quotation before you give it, then the parentheses contain only the page number(s). Accompanying the parenthetical references, all of a paper's sources are included in a "Works Cited" list at the end of the essay.

However, direct quotations are not the only cases in which you must give proper credit to sources: whenever you paraphrase or summarize someone else's words or ideas, or when you take other information from sources, such as statistics and facts not generally known by the public at large, you must still give credit to the source—in the MLA method, by putting in parentheses the author's last name (if not established in the context of your writing) and the page number(s) of prose citations.

The conventions in documenting sources other than prose works published in printed texts vary according to the type of source—poetry, drama in verse (Shakespeare, e.g.), anonymous works, and electronic sources with no pagination, among others. For methods of documenting these other types of sources, consult The MLA Handbook or the writing handbook used in your English class (The Bedford Handbook or The Harbrace Handbook, e.g.). In the examples below, electronic sources such as web pages are indicated by a shortened version of the source's title without page numbers since web pages do not usually include pagination. [Chip's students: See my quotes and documentation web page.]

 

Six forms of plagiarism

1) Word-for-word plagiarism
The most obvious form of plagiarism is copying source material word for word without putting the copied words in quotation marks and acknowledging the source, as in the example below:

Original source material (SparkNotes commentary on Charlotte Brontë's novel, Jane Eyre):
Jane believes that "marrying" Rochester while he remains legally tied to Bertha would mean rendering herself a mistress and sacrificing her own integrity for the sake of emotional gratification (http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/janeeyre/themes.html).

Example of word-for-word plagiarism:
Jane is aware of other passionate feelings that she still has for Rochester. She is not a woman who would deny herself any emotion she has. Jane would never sacrifice her own integrity for the sake of emotional gratification.

Comment: Clearly, the italicized words here are an instance of plagiarism: they are taken directly from the source without acknowledgment.

Proper acknowledgment of source:
Jane is aware of other passionate feelings that she still has for Rochester. She is not a woman who would deny herself any emotion she has. As one SparkNotes commentator suggests, Jane would never "sacrifice her own integrity for the sake of emotional gratification" ("Jane Eyre Themes").

 

2) "Mosaic," or key word and phrase plagiarism
Lifting key words and phrases from source materials and incorporating them into your own writing without quotation marks and proper crediting of the source(s), is also plagiarism.

Original source material (from page 50 of Mark Poster's The Mode of Information. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1990.):
TV ads may be read as signs of the times. They may be collected and assembled as pages of a book or snapshots in an album. Each page or photo is read against the social context. . . . [Ads reveal] the social tensions of the age while offering a resolution of them. The TV ad is interpreted as a social document, a thematics of everyday life.

Example of key word and phrase plagiarism:
Advertisements provide one means of understanding the nature of our culture: they are signs of the times. Ads become freighted with great cultural significance when they are read against the social context in which they occur, and taken in their specific original contexts, all ads can be read as social documents.

Comment: The writer of the example obviously lifted the highlighted phrases from Poster's work without acknowledging the source with quotation marks and parenthetical notation. Even though the majority of the example is the author's own words, plagiarism is still evident.

Proper acknowledgment of source:
Advertisements provide one means of understanding the nature of our culture: they are, as Mark Poster notes, "signs of the times" (50). Ads become freighted with great cultural significance when they are "read against the social context" in which they occur, and taken in their specific original contexts, all ads can be read as "social documents" (Poster 50).

 

3) Plagiarism through paraphrasing
It is plagiarism to take someone else's words or ideas and reformulate them or restate them in your own words when you do not acknowledge the source even though you are not copying the source word for word.

Original source material (from p. 513 of William L. Shirer's The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1960):
Hitler could not wait for negotiations with Russia "by degrees." As he had just revealed to a shocked Ciano, he had set the last possible date for the onslaught on Poland for September 1, and it was now almost the middle of August.

Example of plagiarism through paraphrasing:
In early August of 1939 Hitler grew impatient to come to an agreement with Russia on the plan to invade Poland, which he had determined should take place no later than the first day of September.

Comment: Paraphrasing is a valuable tool: often when it's not important that you quote a particular source word for word but you want to convey the gist of another writer's point, you should by all means feel free to restate that point in your own language. But as your Honor Manual indicates in point 3 on plagiarism under the definition of cheating, "When you paraphrase another's words or idea(s), that is, when you substitute your words for another's words but keep his [or her] idea(s), you do not use quotation marks, but you must cite the source, down to the page number(s)."

Proper acknowledgment of source:
In his Rise and Fall of the Third Reich William Shirer reports that that in early August of 1939 Hitler grew impatient to come to an agreement with Russia on the plan to invade Poland, which he had determined should take place no later than the first day of September (513).

 

4) Plagiarism through summary
Plagiarism also includes summarizing another writer's ideas without crediting the source—distilling, condensing, or compressing into just a few words or sentences a point that another writer makes at some length—in a paragraph, say, or a few paragraphs, or even a number of pages.

Original source material (from p. 93 of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago, 1918-1956. Trans. by Thomas P. Whitney. New York: Harper and Row, 1973.)
If the intellectuals in the plays of Chekhov who spent all their time guessing what would happen in twenty, thirty, or forty years had been told that in forty years interrogation by torture would be practiced in Russia; that prisoners would have their skulls squeezed within iron rings; that a human being would be lowered into an acid bath; that they would be trussed up naked to be bitten by ants and bedbugs; that a ramrod heated over a primus stove would be thrust up their anal canal (the "secret brand"); that a man's genitals would be slowly crushed beneath the toe of a jackboot; and that, in the luckiest possible circumstances, prisoners would be tortured by being kept from sleeping for a week, by thirst, and by being beaten to a bloody pulp, not one of Chekhov's plays would have gotten to its end because all the heroes would have gone off to insane asylums.

Example of plagiarism through summary:
A Chekhov character trying to imagine the future would have gone insane before believing the harsh reality of torture that would emerge in Russian prisons under Soviet rule.

Comment: Just as with paraphrasing, the ability to summarize someone else's writing to bring in important points efficiently is a valuable skill. But it is plagiarism to condense someone else's essential point and present it in your own words without giving the original author proper credit.

Proper acknowledgment of source:
As Solzhenitsyn points out in The Gulag Archipelago, one of Chekhov's intellectuals trying to imagine the future would have gone insane before believing the harsh reality of torture that would emerge in Russian prisons under Soviet rule (93).

 

5) "Global" plagiarism: using another writer's general plan
Taking someone else's ideas in general plan, approach, or outline and presenting them as your own is plagiarism.

Original source material (PinkMonkey.com commentary: "Jane Eyre as a Gothic Novel":)
Point 1: In Jane Eyre Edward Rochester represents the Byronic hero with a secret past.

Point 2: In Jane Eyre, as in many Gothic novels, the reader comes across a lunatic wife (Bertha Rochester) locked in the attic of the manor house.

Point 3: Another feature of the Gothic novel is the use of the supernatural. There are no ghosts in Jane Eyre, but every phase of Jane's life is preceded by her imagining a supernatural visitation from another world. (http://www.pinkmonkey.com/booknotes/monkeynotes/pmJaneEyre80.asp).

Example of "global" plagiarism, following another writer's general plan or approach:
Thesis: Jane Eyre is a Gothic novel in its use of the supernatural, in Mr. Rochester being a Byronic hero, and in Bertha being a lunatic wife.

Topic sentence 1: The use of the supernatural is a feature of the Gothic novel, and while there are no real ghosts in Jane Eyre, Jane does have supernatural "visitations" or premonitions.

Topic sentence 2: Another characteristic in Gothic novels is the presence of a Byronic hero, and Mr. Rochester is clearly a Byronic hero.

Topic sentence 3: Another Gothic feature of Jane Eyre is the presence of the lunatic wife, Bertha Mason.

Comment: The writer of the example paraphrases the original source, but she also clearly follows the general outline or plan of the PinkMonkey commentator, structuring her paper around the three primary points set forth in the original source. The primary ideas in this paper are the PinkMonkey writer's, not the original thinking of the writer of the example. As your Honor Manual indicates in point 4 on plagiarism under the definition of cheating, "When you use only another's idea(s), knowing that they are his [or her] ideas, you must cite the source of that idea or those ideas, down to the page number(s)."

Proper acknowledgment of source:
In addition to giving proper credit for the paraphrased passages, the author of the example here should establish early in the essay that the general approach, the primary points of analysis, were suggested by the PinkMonkey web site.

 

6) Plagiarism by allowing others to write "your" work
While help from trained Writing Center tutors or from classmates in peer editing exercises is allowed by many professors, permitting others to write any portion of work you turn in as your own is plagiarism.

Your task for Part I of this assignment:

To be typed, printed out, and saved to disk (email the file to yourself or save it on floppy disk):

After acknowledging that your source is this web page, restate each of the six forms of plagiarism outlined above in your own words.

Part II: Proper acknowledgment of sources.
In this portion of the exercise, you demonstrate your ability to document source material correctly in direct quotation, paraphrasing, incorporation of key words and phrases, and summary of source material as explained and illustrated above in items 1-4.

Your task for Part II of this assignment:

Also to be typed, printed out, and saved to disk (email the file to yourself or save it on floppy disk).

Read the following two passages, then complete the numbered items below.

Passage A: from p. 400 of "Obsessed with Sport," by Joseph Epstein. The Little, Brown Reader. 7th edition. Ed. by Marcia Stubbs and Sylvan Barnet. New York: HarperCollins, 1996. 394-404.

Sport may be the toy department of life, but one of its abiding compensations is that, at least on the field, it is the real thing. Much has been done in recent years in the attempt to ruin sport—the ruthlessness of owners, the greed of players, the general exploitation of fans. But even all this cannot destroy it. On the court, down on the field, sport is fraud-free and fakeproof. With a full count, two men on, his team down by one run in the last of the eighth, a batter (as well as a pitcher) is beyond the aid of public relations. At match point at Forest Hills a player's press clippings are of no help. Last year's earnings will not sink a twelve-foot putt on the eighteenth at Augusta. Alan Page, galloping up along a quarterback's blind side, figures to be neglectful of that quarterback's image as a swinger. In all these situations, and hundreds of others, a man either comes through or he doesn't. He is alone out there, naked by for his ability, which counts for everything. Something there is that is elemental about this, and something greatly satisfying. (400)

Passage B: from p. 585 of "It Isn't Just a Game: Clues to Avid Rooting," by James C. McKinley, Jr. The Little, Brown Reader. 9th edition. Ed. by Marcia Stubbs, Sylvan Barnet, and William E. Cain. New York: Longman, 2003. 585-89.

       One theory traces the roots of fan psychology to a primitive time when human beings lived in small tribes, and warriors fighting to protect tribes were true genetic representatives of their people, psychologists say.
       In modern society, professional and college athletes play a similar role for a city in the stylized war on the playing field, the theory goes. Even though professional athletes are mercenaries in every sense, their exploits may re-create the intense emotions in some fans that tribal warfare might have in their ancestors. It may also be these emotions that have in large part fueled the explosion in the popularity of sports over the last two decades.

1. Write two or three sentences that include a quotation from either of the two excerpts above, documenting the quoted passage correctly with quotation marks and proper acknowledgment of the source through the MLA method of parenthetical documentation (see QD1 and QD2).

2. Write a brief paragraph—or at least a few sentences—incorporating two or more separate sets of key words or phrases from either or both of the passages above, documenting the quoted words or phrases correctly in the MLA method of parenthetical documentation (see QD1).

3. Write a brief paragraph—or at least a few sentences—paraphrasing any portion of either passage above, giving proper credit to the source through the MLA method of parenthetical documentation (see QD1).

4. Write a brief paragraph, or at least a few sentences, summarizing the essential points of both passages, crediting both sources correctly through the MLA method of parenthetical documentation (see QD1).

To turn in:

Print both parts I and II of this assignment, noting the following on part I (either typed or handwritten): "I have completed the assignment on defining and understanding plagiarism. I agree to abide by the definition of plagiarism outlined in this assignment."

Put your signature below this statement and turn in both parts of the assignment.