What is Plagiarism?
According to the Las Positas College Academic Honesty Statement, Plagiarism is defined as "using another's work (whether printed, electronic, or spoken) without crediting him or her"
(http://www.laspositascollege.edu/facultystaff/honesty.php )
Whereas cheating is almost always intentional, students sometimes plagiarize accidentally. It is vital, therefore, for students to understand the many different kinds of actions that constitute plagiarism:
- Submitting the whole of another's work as one's own (this includes submitting another student's paper or a paper obtained from a commercial term paper service as one's own);
- Using the exact wording of a source without putting that wording in quotation marks and citing it;
- Paraphrasing the wording of a source without citing it;
- Inadequately paraphrasing the wording of a source (not only the words, but the sentence structure of the original must be changed);
- Summarizing the ideas of a source without citing it; and
- Overusing the ideas of a source, so that those ideas make up the majority of one's work.
The bottom line is . . . .
You must cite the sources that you use to avoid plagiarism.
All direct quotes must be cited; all ideas or facts taken from some other writer, even though in your own words, must be cited.
It is PLAGIARISM if you copy another's words without quoting!
If you paraphrase another's ideas or words without giving credit to the author, it is also PLAGIARISM!
