Using someone else's ideas or phrasing and representing those ideas or phrasing as your own, either on purpose
or through carelessness, is a serious offense known as plagiarism. "Ideas or phrasing" includes written
or spoken material, of course -- from whole papers and paragraphs to sentences, and, indeed, phrases -- but it
also includes statistics, lab results, art work, etc. "Someone else" can mean a professional source,
such as a published writer or critic in a book, magazine, encyclopedia, journal or in an electronic resource such
as material you discover on the World Wide Web; another student at your school or anywhere else; a paper-writing
"service" which offers to sell written papers for a fee.
Let us suppose, for example, that you're doing a paper for Music Appreciation on the child prodigy years of
the composer and pianist Franz Liszt and that you've read about the development of the young artist in several
sources. In Alan Walker's book Franz Liszt: The Virtuoso Years (Ithaca: 1983), you read that Liszt's father
encouraged him, at age six, to play the piano from memory, to sight-read music and, above all, to improvise. You
can report in your paper (and in your own words) that Liszt was probably the most gifted of the child prodigies
making their mark in Europe in the mid-nineteenth century because that is the kind of information you could have
gotten from a number of sources; it has become what we call common knowledge. However, if you report on the boy's
father's role in this prodigy's development, you must give proper credit to Alan Walker. You could write, for instance,
the following: Franz Liszt's father encouraged him, as early as age six, to practice skills which later served
him as an internationally recognized prodigy (Walker 59). Or, you could write something like this: Alan
Walker notes that, under the tutelage of his father, Franz Liszt began work in earnest on his piano playing at
the age of six (59). Not to give Walker credit for this important information is plagiarism.
Some More Examples
Here is our original text from Elaine Tyler May's "Myths and Realities of the American Family":
Because women's wages often continue to reflect the fiction that men earn the family wage, single mothers rarely
earn enough to support themselves and their children adequately. And because work is still organized around the
assumption that mothers stay home with children, even though few mothers can afford to do so, child-care facilities
in the United States remain woefully inadequate.
Here are some possible uses of this text. As you read through each version, try to decide if it is a legitimate
use of May's text or a plagiarism.
Version A:
Since women's wages often continue to reflect the mistaken notion that men are the main wage earners in the family,
single mothers rarely make enough to support themselves and their children very well. Also, because work is still
based on the assumption that mothers stay home with children, facilities for child care remain woefully inadequate
in the United States.
Plagiarism In Version A there is too much direct borrowing in sentence structure and wording. The writer
changes some words, drops one phrase, and adds some new language, but the overall text closely resembles May's.
Even with a citation, the writer is still plagiarizing because the lack of quotation marks indicates that Version
A is a paraphrase, and should thus be in the writer's own language.
Version B:
As Elaine Tyler May points out, "women's wages often continue to reflect the fiction that men earn the family
wage" (588). Thus many single mothers cannot support themselves and their children adequately. Furthermore,
since work is based on the assumption that mothers stay home with children, facilities for day care in this country
are still "woefully inadequate." (May 589).
Plagiarism The writer now cites May, so we're closer to telling the truth about our text's relationship
to the source, but this text continues to borrow too much language.
Version C:
By and large, our economy still operates on the mistaken notion that men are the main breadwinners in the family.
Thus, women continue to earn lower wages than men. This means, in effect, that many single mothers cannot earn
a decent living. Furthermore, adequate day care is not available in the United States because of the mistaken assumption
that mothers remain at home with their children.
Plagiarism Version C shows good paraphrasing of wording and sentence structure, but May's original ideas
are not acknowledged. Some of May's points are common knowledge (women earn less than men, many single mothers
live in poverty), but May uses this common knowledge to make a specific and original point and her original conception
of this idea is not acknowledged.
Version D:
Women today still earn less than men -- so much less that many single mothers and their children live near or below
the poverty line. Elaine Tyler May argues that this situation stems in part from "the fiction that men earn
the family wage" (588). May further suggests that the American workplace still operates on the assumption
that mothers with children stay home to care for them (589). This assumption, in
my opinion, does not have the force it once did. More and more businesses offer in-house day-care facilities. .
. .
No Plagiarism The writer makes use of the common knowledge in May's work, but acknowledges May's original
conclusion and does not try to pass it off as his or her own. The quotation is property cited, as is a later paraphrase
of another of May's ideas.
Penalty for Plagiarism
The penalty for plagiarism is usually determined by the instructor teaching the course involved; in many schools
and colleges, it could involve failure for the paper and it could mean failure for the entire course and even expulsion
from school. At the very least, however, students who plagiarize have cheated themselves out of the experience
of being responsible members of the academic community and have cheated their classmates by pretending to contribute
something original which is, in fact, a cheap copy.
Students who do not thoroughly understand the concept of plagiarism and methods of proper documentation should
request assistance from their teacher and from librarians.
The Value of Technology In Our Society?
Northern Virginia Community College Annandale Campus
Senate Statement on The Learning Environment
April 28, 2000
The Annandale campus community is committed to providing a learning environment that encourages the free exchange
of ideas and information. To accomplish this goal, the members of the Annandale Campus Council have established
the following expectations for the campus community:
1. That all backgrounds and cultures be respected.
2. That a free and civil exchange of ideas take place, so everyone in a class feels welcome to participate.
3. That all members of the class arrive on time, leave the class only on breaks or in case of emergency, and leave
classrooms and all college property in good condition.
4. That distractions be kept to a minimum. Cell phones and other electronic devices are turned off in class, labs,
and the library. Students remain seated throughout the class and refrain from talking with classmates while another
class member or the instructor has the floor.
5. That each student submit his or her own work.
6. That consideration be given to classes in adjoining areas.
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