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did i plagiarise ?

flamingmoe

7

hi

(edited 13 years ago)

Reply 1

ForeverIsMyName

15

This isn't D+D material.

My advice? You're a first year. If you've passed the course, then you're fine, and your mark doesn't count. On the other hand, you sound like you did an extremely sloppy job of referencing - You'll learn to reference properly next time you won't make the same mistake again - You'll improve because of the loss of marks you endured.

Reply 2

KwungSun

13

flamingmoe

hi,

i would like to argue to a panel of academics that I (year1 economics student) did not plagiarise, or at least deserve far less harsh punishment.

a piece of essay i submitted was marked down significantly. now, for that essay i was asked, personally, to submit an electronic version - in the email the marker said there were absolutely no presumption involved in asking me; but he probably saw something familiar on the internet.

I did copy and paste a few paragraphs, but rather than "referencing", I acknowleded the source in the bibliography.

I would like to know the background of reference, bibliography so i can make a case for it. since i clearly took steps to ensure creditation of authors i think i can convincingly argue i did not plagiarise. or at least deserve far less punishment considering little research experience as a freshman.

or i am just being naive ??

how can i approach this ?

please advise

thanks

If you copy and paste chunks of writing that are not your own without CLEARLY INDICATING that you have derived these from an external source through the use of quotation marks and footnote/endnote or bracket reference then yes I am afraid you are guilty of plagiarism. Your bibliography is where you list books that you have either referenced more directly elsewhere in the text or that you would like to point out as having given you ideas for your work.

As to the harsh punishment you seem to be receiving, I think your only way out would be if your university had not sufficiently informed you what does and does not constitute plagiarism for them. If it turns out though that they handed out a booklet or something which very explicitly laid out the terms of plagiarism for your course and uni, then I'm afraid you're screwed.

Reply 3

UniOfLife

12

If you copied and paster a few paragraphs without referincing them then it is presumably safe to say that you weren't quoting them as part of your argument (i.e. to quote another source as proof or to discuss that opinion). If you were copying those paragraphs to include them as if they were your own words then that is definitely plagiarism and that was your intent.

If however, your intent was to quote them as proof or to argue their opinion then you might argue that it was clear that these paragraphs were not your own words and could make a case for saying that you had simply been sloppy in referencing but had clearly made no attempt to pass those words off as your own.

Reply 4

flamingmoe

OP

7

i fai

(edited 13 years ago)

Reply 5

la fille danse

17

Was the passage in quotation marks, or was it pasted in the middle of the text seamlessly integrating with the rest of the text?

If the latter, you blatantly plagiarised. Well done. There are no excuses. It baffles me that someone could reach the age of 18 without realising that copy and pasting paragraphs from the internet is plagiarism. Hopefully your university place will be given to someone more deserving.

Reply 6

Dionysus

15

I'm not even at Uni yet and I know full well that putting a note in the Bibliography is insufficient. The same applies in some aspects of A Level. My sister got knocked down a whole classification for a much lesser error.

Reply 7

UniOfLife

12

more adventurous

Was the passage in quotation marks, or was it pasted in the middle of the text seamlessly integrating with the rest of the text?

If the latter, you blatantly plagiarised. Well done. There are no excuses. It baffles me that someone could reach the age of 18 without realising that copy and pasting paragraphs from the internet is plagiarism. Hopefully your university place will be given to someone more deserving.

I heard of a case in which a member of a group copied chunks from wikipedia to submit as part of a group project. Fortunately for the group they spotted it and removed it before submission. Yes, it is amazing how stupid some people can be.

However, if it's the first year and the person genuinely thought they had referenced the material by quoting the source in the bibliography then some leniency could be afforded. Not everyone would have ever quoted from others in an official piece of work before.

Reply 8

KwungSun

13

flamingmoe

can i argue that my intention to accredit original author was clear and sincere, but due to little research experience i made an honest error... ?

Well I certainly wish you luck with this but bear in mind that if this excuse worked then anybody who had plagiarised with the intention of plagiarising could also use this to absolve themselves. Possibly you could argue that if you had really intended to plagiarise, you wouldn't have mentioned the source in your bibliography, and hope they give you that extra 0.5% on the basis of that. Nonetheless it is quite unequivocally plagiarism. I don't really understand why you would copy and paste entire paragraphs in the first place though? Did you do that before you went to university?

EDIT: I think it also depends on how much you really did copy and paste. If it's just a small paragraph or long sentence that looks as though it could be a quote you just forgot to reference you might be in luck. If you actually took large chunks of information that formed a substantive part of your essay and inserted them, you probably deserve the penalty for being so lazy.

Reply 9

hobnob

14

flamingmoe

i did get a handbook about plagiarism.

"To quote facts, figures, theories and theorems without accrediting their original source is an academic malpractice as well as being plagiarism. Direct quotations and results must be attributed stating the author, publication or book, date and page or table number. This also applies to internet sources which must be properly attributed, with URL" - handbook

I'm sorry, but that's straightforward enough - no room for "honest error" there, I'm afraid...

Reply 10

PJ

14

Dionysus

I'm not even at Uni yet and I know full well that putting a note in the Bibliography is insufficient. The same applies in some aspects of A Level. My sister got knocked down a whole classification for a much lesser error.

Reply 11

cutcopy

As the others have said, without referencing it you're trying to pass it off as your own work.

I don't particularly like the Harvard referencing style, I think it looks messy and can disturb the flow of an essay. I always use footnotes - much more discreet and tidy.

Reply 12

ChemistBoy

16

I seem to recall that a PhD student (possibly at Leeds Met) who did pretty much the same thing had a decision by an external examiner who rejected the thesis overturned because it was felt that the call of plagiarism was too harsh for what appeared to be poor referencing of material (needless to say the student failed at a subsequent viva). Can't find out any concrete information though.

Reply 13

UniOfLife

12

Insincere Dave

As the others have said, without referencing it you're trying to pass it off as your own work.

I don't particularly like the Harvard referencing style, I think it looks messy and can disturb the flow of an essay. I always use footnotes - much more discreet and tidy.

Even something as simple as putting the quote in quotation marks with a little number and a reference at the end of the essay would be sufficient. Wouldn't it?

Reply 14

bluenoxid

13

Dionysus

I'm not even at Uni yet and I know full well that putting a note in the Bibliography is insufficient. The same applies in some aspects of A Level. My sister got knocked down a whole classification for a much lesser error.

You might but the current A Level syllabus seems to show a serious lack of regard for referencing. In my 11 years of free education, NO ONE and I mean NO ONE showed me how to reference properly.

Even after the first year of university confusion is rife about how to properly reference.

Whilst the punishment is harsh and the fail has resulted in you failing the year, I would suggest that you state that you did make an effort, but felt confused.

I would also seize on them if they did not give you a referencing lecture

Then again, seeing as you failed the year as the result of failing a piece of coursework, are you sure you are cut out for the remaining years of your course.

Reply 15

kellywood_5

17

Copying and pasting a few paragraphs into your essay is plagiarism. The bibliography is supposed to be for books that you've used for reference purposes, either just to give you a general idea about the topic or to quote from. If you do use quotes, you should put them in quotation marks and insert a footnote at the bottom of the page, and they should really be no more than a line long. Your only hope is to argue that you hadn't been properly informed about how to reference your essay and didn't know that you needed quotation marks and footnotes as well as a bibliography, but your handbook made it pretty clear and to be honest, an 18/19 year old university student should have enough common sense to realise that copying and pasting from the Internet is by no stretch of the imagination your own work and is therefore plagiarism.

Reply 16

bunthulhu

14

more adventurous

Was the passage in quotation marks, or was it pasted in the middle of the text seamlessly integrating with the rest of the text?

If the latter, you blatantly plagiarised. Well done. There are no excuses. It baffles me that someone could reach the age of 18 without realising that copy and pasting paragraphs from the internet is plagiarism. Hopefully your university place will be given to someone more deserving.

Precisely. I can't see how anyone could even try and pass it off as an honest mistake, but then again, if they were daft enough to do it in the first place I guess I wouldn't put it past them...

It's clear plagiarism.

Reply 17

gaijin

1

A few paragraphs? I'm told we can copy about a few lines to reinforce a point or to make reference to a definition. Anything more than that and it gets marked down.

You clearly never took the correct steps to ensure that the reference was made. As Holland & Smith (1988) point out; "it is usually incorrect assumptions and sloppy work that befalls most plagiarism cases."

Reply 18

cutcopy

UniOfLife

Even something as simple as putting the quote in quotation marks with a little number and a reference at the end of the essay would be sufficient. Wouldn't it?

If you're going to put a number at the end of your essay you might as well use a footnote on the same page. That would be referencing it. You still have to put the specific book information in the bibliography to match up with the reference.

Reply 19

Davetherave

10

Digitiser

If you're going to put a number at the end of your essay you might as well use a footnote on the same page. That would be referencing it. You still have to put the specific book information in the bibliography to match up with the reference.

Ever heard of an endnote?

did i plagiarise ?

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