Reference: Writing Resources

This document is provided to all students at Union College because a clear statement is needed about the importance of academic integrity and the associated problem of plagiarism. Every year, in colleges across the country, many students find themselves facing serious charges and penalties as a result of some form of academic dishonesty. You need to understand very clearly the nature of plagiarism, how to avoid it, and the consequences of violating the College policy on academic integrity.[1] Ignorance is not an excuse.

Read and consider this document carefully. Union College expects you to be aware of the nature and consequences of any violation of College standards of academic honesty. If you have any questions, feel free to contact my office.

Kimmo Rosenthal
Dean for Undergraduate Education

Academic Integrity

An essential part of the mission of Union College is "to create in students a lifelong commitment to truth and joy in learning, so that students weave the pursuit of knowledge into the fabric of their lives, and develop an historical awareness and intellectual integrity that will support a resolve to defend the dignity of all people." This commitment to truth in education, as in all other areas of life and thought, is a commitment to integrity and honesty.

What is academic honesty? Here is the way one university has defined the concept:

“…giving credit where it is due and acknowledging the contributions of others to one's own intellectual efforts. [Academic integrity] also includes assuring that one's own work has been completed in accordance with the standards of one's course or discipline. Without academic integrity, neither the genuine innovations of the individual nor the progress of a given field of study can adequately be assessed, and the very foundation of scholarship itself is undermined. Academic integrity, for all these reasons, is an essential link in the process of intellectual advancement.”[2]

At Union College, this code of academic honesty requires at least:

• A personal responsibility to do one’s own work;
• No cheating of any kind on any assignment;
• Respect for academic property such as library and instructional materials of all kinds;
• Open and direct acknowledgement of all sources and ideas derived from other sources, whether paper or electronic;
• Observation of all applicable laws governing intellectual property and copyright.

“…thoughtless or ignorant copying of … passages; unauthorized use of another's work; … cheating on an examination; use of locally available ‘files’ of term papers; the malicious deceptive theft of material from a book, an article, or scientific report; purchase of professionally written research papers; tampering with or destruction of computer files; and the mutilation, destruction, or theft of academic property such as library books, periodicals, and instructional materials of all kinds.”

Plagiarism

One of the most common and serious forms of academic dishonesty is plagiarism. The Oxford American Dictionary of Current English defines plagiarism this way:

1. take and use (the thoughts, writings, inventions, etc., of another person) as one’s own.
2. pass off the thoughts, etc., of (another person) as one’s own.[3]

Plagiarism is the theft of written material or ideas, usually with the intent of presenting the work of another person as one’s own. This kind of theft can range from deliberate, wholesale copying from a book, a journal, or an Internet site to a failure to supply sufficient or accurate information about quoted or derived material. When important words or ideas are not your own, you must give credit and acknowledge the extent of your debt. Word-for-word copying is only one form of literary theft. Much more common is the use of ideas, phrases, and expressions from other works and authors without credit. Extensive paraphrasing is just as bad as literal copying.

Among other things, this definition covers at least the following misbehaviors:

1. “Submitting a paper, examination, lab report, computer program, or assignment written completely or in part by another;
2. Word-for-word copying portions of another's writing without enclosing the copied passage in quotation marks and acknowledging the source in the appropriate scholarly convention;
3. The use of a unique term or concept that one has come across without acknowledging its source;
4. The paraphrasing or abbreviated restating of someone else's ideas without acknowledging that person or source;
5. Falsely citing something that was never actually consulted, or making up a citation;
6. Falsely reporting data that was never actually collected or which actually showed contrary results;
7. Unacknowledged multiple submissions of the same paper for several purposes without prior approval from the parties involved;
8. Unacknowledged multiple authors or collaboration on a project or paper.”[4]

It is possible to be excessively paranoid about this.  Almost none of us ever has a completely original thought, or writes something no one has ever written before.  In fact, many research projects and papers require that you consult and evaluate the work of others. Everything depends on how you incorporate these ideas and words into your own results. A good rule of thumb is this: When it seems as though an idea or expression really did not come from you (and isn’t something everybody knows anyway), give credit. And give credit in the proper form.

When Should I Footnote?

1. When you use the exact words or sentences from a source or author;
2. When you use facts, information, ideas, or lines of argument from a source or author (including anything from the Internet);
3. When you paraphrase another person’s spoken or written words;
4. When you use any form of media (such as pictures or recordings) from another person or source.

It is obvious that whenever you use the same words or sentences as another author, you should enclose those words or sentences in quotation marks (or use some other form of citation, such as an indented paragraph).  If most of your paper consists of quotations, however, you won’t get much credit for originality—however careful you may be to footnote each quotation or passage. Many students believe that the art of the paraphrase is the way around this difficulty. They are wrong. If all you do is change some words in a text, or even reword the text to avoid strict copying but retain the main idea or ideas, you are still in debt to someone else.  Unless you credit the source you may be accused of plagiarism.

Not every idea, fact, or phrase needs to be credited. Something that may be considered common knowledge does not require a footnote or bibliographic citation. That the earth is the third planet from the sun, for example, or that George Washington was the first President of the United States, would not normally require proof or support. In general, commonly accepted facts and dates don’t need documentation, but interpretations and arguments (when taken from others) always do. What is common knowledge may not be the same for everyone, however, so when in doubt, give credit.

It is never sufficient acknowledgement merely to list in a bibliography the sources consulted for a paper, unless these sources were used only for background, with no specific material having been derived from them. But when these sources are used for part of your own argument or discussion, they must also appear in footnotes or endnotes.  A bibliography is a guide to other writings on your subject, not an excuse for literary theft.

Finally, be familiar with the form and standards of bibliographic citation required by your instructor in a particular class or for a particular paper or project.  Following these rules will help you not only decide when it is appropriate to credit another source, but also how to do it.

Some Examples[5]

Source:
Creeds are the intellectual source of the conflict between religion and science, but the bitterness of the opposition has been due to the connection of creeds with Churches and with moral codes.[6]

You:
Creeds are the intellectual source of the conflict between religion and science, but the bitterness of the opposition has been due to the connection of creeds with Churches and with moral codes.

Problem:
This is an exact copy of the original text. Quotation marks are required (or an indented paragraph), along with a footnote and bibliography entry.

Source:
Creeds are the intellectual source of the conflict between religion and science, but the bitterness of the opposition has been due to the connection of creeds with Churches and with moral codes.

You:
The intellectual source of the conflict between religion and science are creeds.  The opposition has been bitter due to the connection of creeds with moral codes and with Churches.

Problem:
This is a mosaic (patchwork) of the original, taking various phrases and words and shifting them around to give the impression of originality.  It would not help to put every stolen word or phrase into quotation marks; the text would become unreadable. The entire paragraph remains a case of plagiarism.

Source:
Creeds are the intellectual source of the conflict between religion and science, but the bitterness of the opposition has been due to the connection of creeds with Churches and with moral codes.

You:
The conflict between religion and science is caused primarily by the conflict between the conceptual content of the two. But the opposition is so bitter because the beliefs and ethical codes of different Churches are so completely different.

Problem:
This is a straightforward paraphrase of the original. Most of the sentences have been broken up and rearranged, and at least some words have been replaced by others with a similar meaning. So, while the words have changed and there is no literal copying, the ideas and general expression are the same. The paraphrased version remains a case of plagiarism. This could be fixed, in some instances, by simply beginning the paragraph with a qualification like “As Bertrand Russell argues….” and including a footnote and bibliography entry. Being able to paraphrase a text successfully can sometimes be a good indication of comprehension, but it should not be resorted to as a tactic for presenting a thought as original.

Source:
Again we see the crystallizing force of Locke’s writing.

You:
The Second Treatise of Government is a veritable quarry of liberal doctrines. In it the crystallizing force of Locke’s writing is markedly apparent.

Problem:
The odds that you would come up with a turn of phrase like “crystallizing force” (or “veritable quarry of liberal doctrines”) are quite small.  Nor is the phrase a common one; that is what makes it so striking.  This use of an apt or unusual expression needs to credit the original author. A simple qualification such as “…in [the author’s] words…” would be sufficient, again with a footnote and bibliography entry.

Conclusion
Academic dishonesty of any kind is not tolerated at Union College. The penalties for plagiarism and other forms of academic fraud are severe. The College expects you to resist the temptations and pressures that may lead you to consider plagiarism or other forms of cheating.  If you are not certain about what constitutes plagiarism, ask your instructors. But the responsibility of avoiding plagiarism is ultimately yours, and yours alone.

[1] Union College Student Handbook.  Schenectady, New York: Union College, 2004.  Retrieved 3 March 2004 from  http://www.union.edu/Handbook/.

[2] University of Texas.  Retrieved 3 March 2004 from http://deanofstudents.utexas.edu/sjs/academicintegrity.html.  This WWW site is an excellent resource on academic integrity and plagiarism.

[3] “plagiarize, v.tr.” The Oxford American Dictionary of Current English. Oxford University Press, 1999. Oxford Reference Online. Oxford University Press.  Union College (NY).  Retrieved 3 March 2004 from  http://www.oxfordreference.com/views/ENTRY.html?subview=Main&entry=t21.e23247.

[4] Wheaton College Student Handbook.  Retrieved 3 March 2004 from http://acunix.wheatonma.edu/kmorgan/Animal_Communication/plagiarism.html.

[5] Some of these examples and the commentary are based on Harold C. Martin, Richard M. Ohmann, and James H. Wheatley, The Logic and Rhetoric of Exposition, 3^rd. ed.  New York, NY: Rinehart and Winston, 1969, pp. 268-277.  Martin was President of Union College from 1965-1974.  Quotation marks have been omitted for the sake of readability, but a glance at the original will reveal the extent of the borrowing. This would not necessarily be a good model for a research paper.

[6] Bertrand Russell, Religion and Science. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997, p. 9.