ELA10 - Spoken Language (2 credit), CSS, Seipp

1. Definition of Plagiarism

When you make research your own, your writing will sound like you. That is exactly what you want. But what you don’t want is to mislead people into thinking that all these ideas are your own. If you do, you may be guilty of plagiarism - the act of presenting someone else’s ideas as your own.

• In word-for-word plagiarism, a researcher repeats the exact words of a source without giving the necessary credit.
• Paraphrase plagiarism occurs when a researcher says basically the same thing as an original source with just a few words changed.
• In spot plagiarism, a researcher uses only a source’s key words or phrases as his or her own without giving credit.

You owe it to your sources, your readers, and yourself to give credit for the ideas you use, unless the ideas are widely accepted as “common knowledge.” Information is considered common knowledge if most people already know it, or if it can be found in nearly any basic reference book on the subject. (The fact that there are 365 days in the year is common knowledge; the fact that it rained 210 days in Seattle during 1990 is not.) (Sebranek, Meyer and Kemper 179)

2. What is citation?

“Citation” refers to the process of precisely documenting evidence gathered from various sources. These sources are usually print-based, but they may also take other forms, such as an oral interview, a video, or a painting.

3. When to Cite?

Students MUST document where they found their evidence. This does not mean that you have to document every sentence in your essay or assignment, but you must document the following:

• direct quotations

• paraphrased information

• information that is not “common knowledge” or that could not be found in a standard reference book.

For example, the fact that the North-West rebellion took place in 1885 is a standard piece of information and need not be cited. But information that does not seem to be standard-- i.e., that the rebellion was a conspiracy engineered by the Tories—does need to be documented if found in a reference because it is not common knowledge and is not your own idea.