All videos used with permission
What is Plagiarism?
This definition is borrowed with permission from Dartmouth College's Institute for Writing & Rhetoric
Plagiarism is intellectual theft. It occurs when you use the words or ideas of others without acknowledging that you have done so. If you are aware of a source, use an idea or quotation from this source, and fail to cite it, then you have plagiarized—regardless of your intent.
If you quote from a source, you must specifically mark the quoted material and immediately cite the source. Place the quoted text in quotation marks or format it as a block quotation. Your citation should appear at the point of quotation, either in parentheses or in a footnote or end note. Listing the source in a bibliography does not, by itself, constitute proper citation; you must cite at the point of use.
If you quote a distinctive phrase, or even a single distinctive word, place it in quotation marks and cite the source.
If you paraphrase an idea or special information from a source—that is, if you restate the idea, but alter the exact wording—you must cite that source.
If you use images, maps, charts, tables, data sets, musical compositions, movies, new-media compositions, computer source code, song lyrics, and the like, you must cite the source.
How to Avoid Plagiarism
We believe that the majority of instances of plagiarism are the result of students not understanding the rules. The following guidelines should help you avoid the pitfall of plagiarism.
As you do research for your paper, document your findings. This is where keeping a research journal can be very valuable. Think about recording your key words, search strategies, and make sure as you take notes to record the source of those notes. Make sure to indicate direct quotes, and when you have summarized an author's ideas.
Don't leave a research assignment to the last minute. You are far more likely to be sloppy in your documentation or cut corners when you are trying to hurry the research process. Use the Research Timeline Calculator to predict how long your assignment will take and plan accordingly.
Never, no matter how desperate you are, buy a research paper from an internet source. It is a waste of money AND is not worth the embarrassment and academic consequences of being caught. The likelihood of being caught is very high!
To Learn More About Plagiarism and How to Avoid It
OWL Site: Avoiding Plagiarism
Collaborating with Your Peers
Adapted with permission from Dartmouth College's Writing & Rhetoric Institute
Being part of a scholarly community often requires that you collaborate with others on your work. Collaborating can pose special problems. We offer here some typical examples of collaboration and the citation challenges that they raise.
When assigning problem sets, instructors expect you to turn in your own work. If your instructor allows you to talk to others in the class or use the course textbook or web resources, you should be careful to abide by their guidelines for using these resources. When in doubt about how to collaborate and cite appropriately, ask your instructor.
When you are asked to write collaboratively, be sure that you understand the terms of the collaboration and that you follow them carefully. Consider recording who does what, in terms of writing and research, and make the record available to all collaborators, so that no one will dispute what it contains, should some aspect of the collaboration come into question. If particular students have completed specific tasks (one has done the research, another the drafting, another the editing and citation checking), you might want to make a note of this distribution of labor at the paper’s end. Because you are responsible for the content of any work that bears your name, you should read over any such work before it is submitted.
