Plagiarism Using others’ ideas & words without clearly acknowledging the source of that information Why do we care? It’s ethical It’s the law Intellectual theft/artistic & intellectual ownership People need to be able to trace your research NOTES

Notes for Slide 1 Derived from the Latin word plagiarius (“kidnapper”) “Nearly all research builds on previous research. Researchers commonly begin a project by studying past work in the area and deriving relevant information and ideas from their predecessors. This process is largely responsible for the continual expansion of human knowledge. In presenting their work, researchers generously acknowledge their debts to predecessors by carefully documenting each source, so that earlier contributions receive appropriate credit. As you prepare your paper, you should similarly seek to build on the work of previous writers and researchers. And whenever you draw on another’s work, you must also document your source by indicating what you borrowed—whether facts, opinions, or quotations—and where you borrowed it from.” MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers: Fifth Edition, p. 114

Plagiarism To avoid plagiarism, you must give credit whenever you use ……… Another person’s ideas, opinion or theory Any facts, statistics, graphs, drawings, photographs Any pieces of information that are not common knowledge Quotations of another person’s actual spoken or written words Paraphrase of another person’s spoken or written words

Plagiarism Using another person’s phrases or sentences without putting quotation marks around them or providing a parenthetical citation is considered plagiarism even if you cite the source in your “Works Cited”! Copying something over and changing every couple of words is not paraphrasing. It is plagiarism.

Paraphrasing Original material (Martin, Wendy. “Emily Dickinson.” Columbia Literary History of the United States. Emory Elliott, gen. Ed. New York: Columbia UP, ” “Some of Dickinson’s most powerful poems express her firmly held conviction that life cannot be fully comprehended without an understanding of death.” If you write the following sentence without any documentation, you have committed plagiarism: “Emily Dickinson strongly believed that we cannot understand life fully unless we also comprehend death.” Correct: “As Wendy Martin has suggested, Emily Dickinson strongly believed that we cannot understand life fully unless we also comprehend death (625).”

MLA Style In MLA style, you acknowledge your sources by keying brief parenthetical citations in your text to an alphabetical list of works that appears at the end of the paper. Example in your paper: Ancient writers attributed the invention of the monochord to Pythagoras, who lived in the sixth century BC (Marcuse 197). In your Works Cited list: Marcuse, Sibyl. A Survey of Musical Instruments. New York: Harper, NOTES

Notes for Slide 6 A parenthetical citation in MLA style contains only enough information to enable readers to find the source in the works cited list. If the author’s name is mentioned in the text, only the page number appears in the citation. If more than one work by the author is in the list of works cited, a shortened version of the titles is given as in this example. References in the text must clearly point to specific sources in the list of works cited. Identify the location of the borrowed information as specifically as possible. Give the relevant page number(s) in the parenthetical reference. Keep parenthetical references as brief and as few as clarity and accuracy permit. Place the parenthetical reference where a pause would naturally occur (preferably at the end of a sentence), as near as possible to the material documented. When your bibliography lists only work by the author cited, you need give only the author's last name and page number(s): (Patterson ). If the work is listed by title in the bibliography, use the title and page number(s) in your parenthetical documentation. Although the list of works cited appears at the end of your paper, you need to draft the section in advance so that you will know what information to give in parenthetical references as you write. --- Key brief parenthetical citations in your text to your alphabetical list of works cited. --- References in the text must clearly point to specific sources in the list of works cited. --- Identify the location of the borrowed information as specifically as possible. Give the relevant page number(s) in the parenthetical reference. --- Keep parenthetical references as brief and as few as clarity and accuracy permit. --- Place the parenthetical reference where a pause would naturally occur (preferably at the end of a sentence), as near as possible to the material documented. --- When your works cited lists only one work by an author, you give only the author's last name and page number(s) in the parenthetical citation: (Patterson ). --- If more than one work by an author is in the list of works cited, a shortened version of the title is also included in the parenthetical documentation. --- If the work is listed by title in the works cited list, use the title and page number(s) in your parenthetical documentation. --- If the author's name is mentioned in the text of your work, only the page number appears in the citation.

Works Cited List Although the list of works cited appears at the end of your paper, you need to draft the section in advance, so that you will know what information to give in parenthetical references as you write. Works cited Works cited examples sheet is available on the library’s web site. Use copy and paste for speed and accuracy. Be sure to review the formatting hints. NOTES

Notes for Slides Double-space between successive lines of an entry and between entries. --- Begin the first line of an entry flush left and indent successive lines ½". (Microsoft Word will do this easily with the hanging indent option. (Go to format paragraph, indents and spacing, indentation, then open the more options arrow under “special”.) --- List entries in alphabetical order according to the first word in the citation. --- Drop any initial article (e.g. "A", "The", "An"). --- If no author is given, start the citation with the title. --- Separate author, title, and publication information with a period followed by one space. --- Do not number a Works Cited list. --- Paginate the bibliography as a continuation of your text.

Annotated List of Works Cited An annotated bibliography, also called Annotated List of Works Cited, contains descriptive or evaluative comments on the sources. Example Thompson, Stith. The Folktale. New York: Dryden, A comprehensive survey of the most popular folktales, including their histories and their uses in literary works.

Friendly Reminders Do not number a works cited list. Do alphabetize your works cited list. Double-space; hanging indent Librarians will proofread if you ask in a polite, timely fashion! Don’t be afraid to ask for help or guidance. Give credit where credit is due. Source: Gibaldi, Joseph. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers: Fifth Ed. New York: The Modern Language Association of America, By Ann Sciuto, Campbell Hall. December 2002.