Plagiarism

Plagiarism or not? You have too much work to do and your English essay is due. Instead of doing this essay, you hand in an essay on the same topic that you did last year for another subject.

Plagiarism or not? You found some excellent music on a free shareware site, which you have used in a PowerPoint presentation. You acknowledge the source of the music, even though it was from a shareware site.

Plagiarism or not? You have found a funny video clip on YouTube and decide to use it in the video you are making. You don’t worry about putting it in the credits at the end of your video.

Plagiarism or not? You have used several statements that are common knowledge in your report (e.g. The Big Day Out is a series of popular outdoor music festivals held in Australia). You don’t worry about referencing that information.

Plagiarism or not? On the Internet you have found just the right sentence to add to your photography assignment. You cut and paste it into your assignment and don’t acknowledge it.

Plagiarism or not? On the Internet you have found just the right sentence to add to your photography assignment. You cut and paste it into your assignment and don’t acknowledge it. What could you have done?

On the Internet you have found just the right sentence to add to your photography assignment. You cut and paste it into your assignment. Instead of: The first technology was the primitive modes of communication used by prehistoric people before the development of spoken language. Use quotes and a textural reference: Frick (1991) believes that "... the first technology was the primitive modes of communication used by prehistoric people before the development of spoken language" (p. 10).

Direct quotations must be identified with indentation or quotation marks and be properly cited. When you copy words, phrases, sentences, or paragraphs from a source you must acknowledge the author with a proper reference.

Paraphrases, restatements or summaries of the sense of another author’s ideas in your own words, must also be properly referenced. You may begin the paraphrase with signal phrases such as According to Smith, …. or A recent study has shown … Include a reference to the original work in your bibliography.

Images, video and sound clips, or software programs that you download from the Internet must be properly cited. Even though you can easily download them it is still plagiarism to claim them as your own intellectual property by not properly referencing the creator. See textural reference examples at