The Basileiad Library at Manor College. Information Literacy course. Plagiarism.

Plagiarism is the use of someone else’s words without acknowledging their authorship. 'Plagiarus' is the Latin word for 'kidnapper'. Plagiarism is listed in the Manor College Student Handbook as a major violation, and is considered a serious issue. Careers have been ruined because of it. Avoid plagiarism by ensuring that the reader can tell that you are using someone else’s words, and by citing the work in full. To do this you use quotation marks:

“In the center of our work,
ever were it black,
shines an inexhaustible sun…”

or identify the author by some signal phrase such as: 

Camus always felt an irrepressible optimism, …

and then show where you found this information in a pre-defined format:

Camus, Albert. L’Ete. Paris: Gallimard, 1954. p.137.

You can use any format, usually the one requested by the lecturer, but you should always stick to the same style for each assignment. MLA style is the most commonly used at Manor College (see the 'Works Cited' page).

Cyber-plagiarism is the downloading of papers from the internet. Lecturers have ways of checking whether a paper has been plagiarized. There is even software available that can check for it.

If you plagiarize you will be caught. You will fail your paper and your subject. It's just not worth it.

The next module to come is about citing articles and preparing 'works cited' pages.

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