Citing Sources…. Avoiding Plagiarism

Whenever you use a source in a research paper, you have to cite it. This means to “give credit” to the author who wrote the paper.

That means every SENTENCE that is not your own MUST BE CITED. That is the bottom line.

Plagiarizing is using another person’s words or ideas as your own, without giving credit (citing) to the source. Plagiarism is one reason some students are expelled from colleges & universities. In most colleges if you are accused of plagiarism, you will be brought to a hearing where peers and a board will determine your punishment. This can be very embarrassing, not to mention damaging to your future. Colleges have very strict rules about this, and rules growstricter every year. Plagiarism is not only copying word for word something another person wrote, it is also changing those words and pretending they are your own. To avoid plagiarism, write your own thoughts and ideas about your project before beginning your research. When in doubt – CITE YOUR SOURCE.

Plagiarism is:

  1. Copying word for word (no citations)
  2. Passing off other’s ideas as your own.
  3. Paraphrasing (no citations)
  4. “Paraphrasing” – just changing a few words and pretending it’s a paraphrase.
  5. Copying another’s work or sources (including other classmates)
  6. Not providing a source when needed.
  7. Cutting and pasting portions of papers and passing them off as your own.
  8. Allowing someone else to do the paper.
  9. Failing to quote or give credit.
  10. Fabricating a quote or a source.
  11. Getting other’s works (or purchased work) off the internet and the like

You will not be able to say, “I didn’t know that was plagiarism.” You know if you paid attention, took notes, and followed your instructions.

NOTE: ANYONE CAUGHT PLAGIARISING ON ANY PAPER WILL RECEIVE AN AUTOMATIC ZERO AND A POSSIBLE DISCIPLINE REFERRAL. THIS PAPER COUNTS AS A TEST SO YOU WILL HAVE A ZERO ON THE TEST.

Some common Q’s & A’s from:

Q: What Is a Paraphrase, Anyway?

Paraphrase is stating someone else's ideas in your own words. If you think about it a little, you will realize that it's something that we all do, all the time. So why do you have to cite the source of something when you are writing? Doesn't this also bog down the process? Yeah, in some of the papers you read it seems like there are more footnotes than the paper text itself. But yes, you do have to cite sources, even for a paraphrase. When your friend reads your paper, you're not around. He can't call you and ask you for the source.

Q: My friends get stuff from the internet. What’s the big deal?

The practical consequence of all this information in electronic form is that you will be tempted. You'll find out there are sites where you can download whole papers, and you'll be able to find articles about many topics within a moment's notice. Of course your teachers have access to these same tools with the same lightening quick speeds, but that's not the point. You're not in school to play a cat and mouse game with your teacher to see if you can fool him or her by using someone else's work. You are in school to hone your mind into a reliable thinking machine that will serve you well throughout the rest of your life. This is the number one skill you are here to obtain: thinking. Why do you think the system of education has changed so little over the past few thousand years?

A tip: Always write your papers from scratch, starting with a blank screen. Don't cut and paste from various documents. If you do cut and paste a little, make sure each passage is properly quoted and cited. Do the citation work at the time of writing instead of leaving it for the end. Be realistic about what you are doing. If you are doing a lot of cutting and pasting, chances are you are not writing a very good paper.

Q: ButI Don't Have Time to Do It Right!

If you choose to spend your time so as to leave too little for writing, then I have little advice to give you. You should accept the possibility that you will get a lower grade rather than risking plagiarism, a zero grade, and possibly a discipline referral. If you are unable to get the papers done, you can always try the age-old remedy of asking for an extension AHEAD of the due date. Otherwise, turn it in late, but don’t plagiarize.

Works Cited – see instruction on how to do it/sample on my website!!!

CITING WITHIN YOUR PAPER

If you have a source that is not a COMMON knowledge source, the best papers will provide a brief explanation to “qualify” a source. You only need to do this the first time you use the source.

Stanford historian Melvin Smithback identified this trend as “populace lacing” (Smithback 5).

Or

A White House press release dated January 9, 2009 identified the source as “one who worked closely with the advisor” (Langford).

Within your paper, you will include quotes and information from your research. In MLA style, referring to the works of others in your text is done by using what's known as parenthetical citation. Immediately following a quotation from a source or a paraphrase of a source's ideas, you place the author(s) name followed by a space and the relevant page number(s).

Human beings have been described as "symbol-using animals" (Burke 3).

MLA format follows the author-page method of in-text citation. This means that the author's last name and the page number(s) from which the quotation or paraphrase is taken must appear in the text, and a complete reference should appear on your Works Cited page. The author's name may appear either in the sentence itself or in parentheses following the quotation or paraphrase, but the page number(s) should always appear in the parentheses, not in the text of your sentence. For example:

Wordsworth stated that Romantic poetry was marked by a "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" (263).

Romantic poetry is characterized by the "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" (Wordsworth 263).

Wordsworth extensively explored the role of emotion in the creative process (263).

The citation, both (263) and (Wordsworth 263), tells readers that the information in the sentence can be located on page 263 of a work by an author named Wordsworth. If readers want more information about this source, they can turn to the Works Cited page, where, under the name of Wordsworth, they would find the following information:

Wordsworth, William. Lyrical Ballads. London: Oxford U.P., 1967.

Anonymous Work/Author Unknown

If the work you are citing has no author, use an abbreviated version of the work's title. (For non-print sources, such as films, TV series, pictures, or other media, or electronic sources, include the name that begins the entry in the Works Cited page). For example:

An anonymous Wordsworth critic once argued that his poems were too emotional ("Wordsworth Is a Literary Genius").

Long Quotations

For this paper, you should NOT be quoting and quoting long sentences!!! If the quote is longer than 2-3 sentences, it’s too long.

Constructing your Works Cited:

  1. Entries should be in alphabetical order. If you do this the way I ask on Easybib, you will have NO problems!
  2. You do NOT have to provide a URL for an online database, but any other website, you do.
  3. Books and magazines ALWAYS have page numbers, unless they are online. So be sure you clarify if you found it online or not. If it’s a regular book, your in-text citation will say something like: (Astin 45).

Drafting paper

All pages should be numbered sequentially with the writer’s last name (see sample paper)

Be sure you have 1” margins all around (older Word versions use 1.25” and your teacher can tell!) and a 12 point Times or Times New Roman Font – always.

Titles are not put in quotes or underlined!

Works Cited

Anderson, J. "Keats in Harlem." New Republic 204.14 (8 Apr. 1991): n. pag. Online. EBSCO. 29 Dec. 1996.

Astin, Alexander W. Achieving Educational Excellence. Washington: Jossey-Bass, 1985.

Burka, Lauren P. "A Hypertext History of Multi-User Dimensions." MUD History. URL: (5 Dec. 1994).

Christie, John S. "Fathers and Virgins: Garcia Marquez's Faulknerian Chronicle of a Death Foretold." Latin American Literary Review 13.3 (Fall 1993): 21-29. NCWiseOwl. 10 Oct. 2011.

Creation vs. Evolution: "Battle of the Classroom."Videocassette. Dir. Ryall Wilson, PBS Video, 1982. (MLA) 58 min.

Feinberg, Joe. "Freedom and Behavior Control." Encyclopedia of Bio-ethics, I, 93-101. (MLA) New York: Free Press, 1992. Web. 14 Sept. 2011

Jones, V.S., M.E. Eakle, and C.W. Foerster. A History of Newspapers. Cambridge, Eng.: Cambridge UP, 1987.

"Money." Compton's Precyclopedia. 1977 ed., X, 80-91.

Mumford, Lewis. The Highway and the City. New York: Harcourt Brace and World, 1963.

Pikarsky, M. and Christensen, D. Urban Transportation Policy and Management. Boston: D.C. Heath, 1976.

Shaw, Webb. "Professionals are Required to Report Abuse." Akron (Ohio) Beacon Journal, Nov. 11, 1984 (Located in NewsBank [Microform]. Welfare and Social Problems, 1984, 51: D12-14, fiche).

Sixty Minutes. CBS. WFSB, Hartford. 3 May 1991.

U.S. Dept. of Commerce. U.S. Industrial Outlook. Washington, D.C., Government Printing Office, 1990.