AVOIDING
PLAGIARISM
Academic
Writing
Writing of any type is governed by rules:
spelling, punctuation, grammar, etc. Academic
writing requires that writers follow these conventions
as well as others, such as building on the scholarship
of others. Sometimes
the conventions of academic writing seem contradictory.
- research
your topic, but write something new
- use
experts and authorities in the field, but challenge
their ideas
- use
what you read as a way to improve your English,
but use your own voice
- give
credit for the sources you use, but make your own
contribution to the subject
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Understanding academic writing conventions
will not only strengthen and improve your writing, but
help you avoid plagiarism.
What
is Plagiarism?
In
its simplest form, plagiarism is copying another person’s
work or borrowing someone’s
original ideas without crediting the source of the work
or ideas.
Other actions viewed as plagiarism:
- buying
a term paper
- cutting
and pasting from sources to create a paper
- hiring
someone to write a paper for you
- submitting
a paper written for one class to fulfill an assignment
in another class
- using
a source too closely when paraphrasing
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Plagiarism can be avoided by citing sources
used in a paper and properly paraphrasing the information
in those sources.
Citing
Sources more
on citing sources
Whenever you incorporate the words, ideas,
or key phrases created by someone else into your writing,
you must give credit to the original author by citing the
source. Your professor
may require you to use a particular style for citing sources,
such as the MLA (Modern Language Association) style or
APA (American Psychological Association) style. Each
discipline usually has an accepted style
manual that governs
not only the writing conventions of that discipline but
citation formats.
| Must be cited: |
Need
not be cited: |
- direct quotes, whether whole sentences/passages
or just a phrase
- paraphrases
of another person’s ideas
- information obtained through an interview, e-mail
correspondence or online
- reprinted pictures, charts, maps, graphs, illustrations,
films, videos, TV or radio broadcasts
|
- your own experiences, ideas, or opinions
- results from your own experiment
- sayings
or quotations that are well known, such as "
A penny saved is a penny earned" or "Ask not
what your country can do for you..."
- common
knowledge, such as the average temperature
of the human body is 98.6 degrees.
|
Paraphrasing
When
you paraphrase a passage, you are restating the author’s
ideas in your own words. You
must still include a citation to the passage because the
ideas are not yours.
Paraphrasing tips:
- read
the passage several times so you are sure you
understand it
- turn it
over and write your version of the ideas without
looking at the original text
- begin your
paraphrase with “According to So-and-so” to alert
your reader that what follows are someone else’s
ideas
|
Students sometimes
think they have paraphrased a passage by making the
following changes:
- rearranging
the order of the sentences
- substituting
synonyms for words or phrases
- joining
together two or more simple sentences to make a
compound sentence
|
See
examples of Plagiarism vs. Paraphrasing 
