Istanbul Bilgi University

Plagiarism and Citing Sources

Presented by C. M. Herrington, MAA, MAT

1

“Plagiarism is using others’ ideas

and words without clearly

acknowledging the source of that

information”

(Writing Tutorial Services, 2004).

Notice that it does not matter whether or

not the failure to give credit is intentional.

Any lack of credit, even accidental, is

considered plagiarism.

At California State University San

Marcos, the General Catalog (2008)

defines plagiarism as:

1.not giving proper credit for ideas,

words, or “specific substance of another’s

work,” (84)

2.claiming authorship on a group project

without actually doing the work,

3.claiming someone else’s artistic or

scholarly work as your own.

Any form of information requires acknowledgement. A common perception is that only the exact copying of words from a printed publication constitutes plagiarism. The requirement to acknowledge sources is much broader. In particular, it is important to understand that the source of ideas — opinions, theories, facts, etc. — as well as words must be credited..

Sources of words and ideas come in many forms, all of which require proper attribution to avoid plagiarism. This web site focuses on plagiarism as it appears in student papers using written sources but the concepts can be applied to any type of source material. Information sources can include:

• spoken words such as conversations and interviews,

• written words including email and web pages as well as published and print materials,

• multimedia such as movies, music and photographs, and

• any other way to express an idea including statistics, drawings, graphs, maps, etc.

2

Exact Copy Plagiarism

There are two types of exact copy plagiarism — whole source and partial copy.

Whole source plagiarism is claiming an entire work as your own. The most common example is when a student puts his or her name on a paper written by another person. Whole source plagiarism also includes claiming to be the creator of such things as a work of art, an entire song, or a scientific theorem.

Examples of plagiarizing an entire paper include turning in as your own work:

a friend’s paper

a purchased paper

a paper published in another source such as a journal or the Internet

Partial copy plagiarism occurs when the exact words or content from a source are inserted as part of your paper without giving proper attribution. Examples include

cutting and pasting from an electronic source

copying from a printed source

repeating a conversation, interview remarks, etc. verbatim

inserting a photo, audio clip, or other multimedia element

3

Paraphrase Many people believe that putting a

piece of text or an idea into ‘their own words’ avoids the issue of plagiarism. There is a formal term for putting text or ideas into ‘your own words’ — it is called paraphrasing.

The purpose of paraphrase is often to summarize or simplify the author’s ideas, making them easier to understand, more approachable. You might also use paraphrase to emphasize a particular idea or train of thought from the original author’s text. Paraphrasing is acceptable but it is important to acknowledge the original author’s ideas, even if it is has been substantially re-expressed.

It is important to be cautious rewriting a piece of information in your own words, or paraphrasing. Close paraphrase, where trivial changes are made such as substituting similar words or changing the sentence order, is essentially the same as copying the author’s words directly.

This is not enough to count as an original expression of the idea and is still considered a form of exact copy plagiarism.

4

Common Knowledge Not all ideas require attribution,

specifically, facts that are common knowledge. Common knowledge exists when a fact can be found in numerous places or is likely to be known by a lot of people.

For example, you do not need to document the fact that Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States since this information is widely known.

On the other hand, you must credit your source for facts that are not generally known or ideas that interpret facts. For example, Lincoln’s tall and gangly stature is consistent with symptoms of Marfan syndrome (Davidson, 2004).

5

We often assume that all

people who plagiarize

are deliberately

dishonest. In fact

intentionally planned

plagiarism is fairly rare.

Much of plagiarism is

simply due to

carelessness, or to not

understanding what

plagiarism means. 6

How to avoid it…

Quiz time to check understanding

7

You can use your notes to answer the following quiz

questions.

Quiz- write down your answers only

8

Is it plagiarism? YES or NO

1. You write a paper on the legalizationof marijuana for your high schoolCurrent Events class. You save thatpaper and hand it in to satisfy thepersuasive paper requirement in yourEAP class here at IBU. Is it plagiarism?

2. You are working on a computerslide show presentation for your EAPclass. You want to make the point thatShakespeare’s works have beenplagiarized throughout the centuries. You capture a painting of Shakespeare from the Web for your first slide. Is it plagiarism?

3. In your computer slide showpresentation about Shakespeare’s works, you include a snippet of famous dialoguefrom Romeo and Juliet. Is it plagiarism?

4. You decide the best way to get acrossyour point about Shakespeare’s worksbeing plagiarized is to show someexamples. You include a video clip fromthe film West Side Story in yourpresentation. Is it plagiarism?

5. Your professor says some interestingthings in today’s lecture on Plato. Youdecide to use her ideas to begin yourpaper. Is it plagiarism?

Answers

9

1.The answer: Yes.

It’s called self-plagiarism or multiple submission, and it’snot allowed unless you have the permission of the EAP instructorHow do you fix the plagiarism problem?

In most cases, you are expected to produce new work forevery college class you take. However, you may ask yourprofessors about their individual policies regardingmultiple submissions.

2. The answer: Yes, unless you provide an acknowledgment somewhere in your slide show of thesource of the painting.

While it is not a violation of copyright to use such a captured image for educational purposes for one class, it may be a violation to use the image in a setting with a larger audience or with the potential to make money: using the image to sell your brand of beard trimmer, forexample.

How do you fix the plagiarism problem?

Get in the habit of adding a list of acknowledgments toevery presentation. You can include sources for imagesand video as well as thanks for the people who helpedyou.

3. The answer: Probably not.

Shakespeare’s plays have become part of commonknowledge. Practically anyone can quote the morefamous passages: “Oh, Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo?”

How do you fix the plagiarism problem?

You can always play it safe and include an

4. The answer: No, unless you try to pass offthe film as your own work.

How do you fix the plagiarism problem?

The important point is to let your audience knowthe source of the video you’re showing. Anddon’t show too much of it, so that the bulk of yourpresentation doesn’t turn out to be someoneelse’s work.

5.The answer: Yes.

You must acknowledge the use of any ideas thatare not your own.

How to cite sources

10

Citing your sources has several specific benefits for you the student. Of course, a primary benefit is that it shows you are crediting your sources and so avoiding the possibility of plagiarizing.

Even more important though is that it gives you credit. It is concrete documentation of the hard work you have done in researching the background of your topic including the ideas other people have had on the subject.

Professors generally respect and reward well-researched papers.

Identify the source of an idea, specific words, or other material in order to acknowledge its contribution to your paper. It is the existence of these acknowledgments, or lack there of, that is the determiner of whether material has been plagiarized.

Enable the reader to locate the original source:

so that they may verify the accuracy of your information, and

so that they may use it in their own research. In fact, a highly successful research strategy is to locate one good source and then use the citations in it’s bibliography and notes to identify additional relevant sources.

Provide the reader with a sense of the relevance and quality of the sources used in researching the paper and, hence, a sense of the quality of the paper. Indicators of quality include:

the variety of sources from different viewpoints and mediums (print and online),

the source’s appropriateness to the topic as inferred from the title,

the sources objectivity as implied by the type of site (.com vs. .edu) and sponsoring organization, and

the authority or expertise on this topic of the author or sponsoring organization of the Web site.

Citing online sources

11

The rules for citation styles were developed for print sources — long before online documents were available. So not too surprisingly, it can be difficult to locate identifying information equivalent to that available in print publications in an online source and fit it into a traditional citation format.

Sometimes you have to do some investigation. Understanding the basic purposes of citation can help you determine what information you really need.

The three basic purposes of citation are to:

identify your source,

enable others to locatethe source, and

provide brief criteria to evaluate the source’s relevance and quality.

Citation Styles

12

Rules for citing sources and citation formats can get complicated. A number of style guides have been developed that provide consistency in how information is cited. Some of the most common styles are APA, Chicago, and MLA.

Citation styles are often associated with certain professional groups and disciplines. For instance, APA, American Psychological Association, is often used in the sciences while MLA, Modern Language Association, is popular in the literature and humanities area.

Rules for citation styles change over time, particularly recently with the Internet, so it is important to use the latest edition. Any library will have some, if not all, of these style guides.

APA

Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, 6th ed.(2009). Washington, DC : American

Psychological Association.

The basic format for citing Web sources in APA style is:Author’s name (last name, first and any middle initials). (Date of Internet posting or revision). Title of page. Title of complete work [if applicable]. Retrieval statement.

Neyhart, D. & Karper, E. (2008). APA formatting and style guide.

Purdue University Online Writing Lab. Retrieved Aug. 29, 2011, from:

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560 /01/

American Psychological Association. (2011). "Basics of

APA Style". APAStyle.org.Retrieved Aug. 29, 2011, from: <http://www.apastyle.org/learn/t

ut orials/basics-tutorial.aspx>

Son of a citation machine

13

A lot has changed with regard to citation. One online source for helping you make citations is

Son of a citation machine.

http://citationmachine.net/index2.php?reqstyleid=2&newstyle=2&stylebox=2

Task: Use the citation machine to make citations for all 6 of your sources.

You need to list them alphabetically by last name or title on the sheet of paper.

Double space and use a hanging indent from the second line.

Sample Reference Page

14